Right, I don't think you and OP are in conflict at all. Basically, GUIs presently suck. The average perfomance differences between TUI's and GUI's point directl

Right, I don't think you and OP are in conflict at all. Basically, GUIs presently suck. The average perfomance differences between TUI's and GUI's point directly to the fact that GUIs are very very bloated. There's no reason that a GUI shouldn't be as performant as a TUI, given the relative minimum it ought to take to convert one to another. A little vector here and raster support there should mostly take care of it.