In my company GIS applications are very important. To improve performance some 6000 Euro have been spent on a new PC (2x4 core XEONS with 12 MB L2 Cache, Raid Controller, fast memory, etc.). Theoretically the new PC should be at least twice as powerful as a 2 years old PC which it replaces as the major workhorse. Comparative tests have shown ZERO improvement in execution times. The tests done so far involve extensive floating point calculations and DB I/O (calculating the area of parcels, creating shapes for some 4000 polygons and doing the I/O for ORACLE). DB connection is done via ORACLE 11g2 (with latest patches). OS is XP 32 prof. SP3. Microstaton XM in the latest download version is used.
Performace has always been an issue and on older PCs of the pentium class the programms have run for hours on end (10 and more hours). Upgrading hardware on an almost yearly basis has always brought down execution times but not this time. This last and most costly hardware update done right now has shown no improvement at all which is very, very frustrating.
The programms in question have been developed over almost 10 years and the company who is doing this says it would be difficult to isolate the relevant code so that it could be testet meaningfully in another environment.
Any ideas, suggestions or explanations are welcome. It must be also of concern to Bentley if Microstation does not seem to make use of advancements in hardware. I had great hopes to cut down the many 3 Minutes plus waiting times which cannot be used otherwise. These hopes has been crushed so far.
Regards
Erwin
Erwin: In my company GIS applications are very important. To improve performance some 6000 Euro have been spent on a new PC (2x4 core XEONS with 12 MB L2 Cache, Raid Controller, fast memory, etc.). Theoretically the new PC should be at least twice as powerful as a 2 years old PC which it replaces. Comparative tests have shown ZERO improvement in execution times.
In my company GIS applications are very important. To improve performance some 6000 Euro have been spent on a new PC (2x4 core XEONS with 12 MB L2 Cache, Raid Controller, fast memory, etc.). Theoretically the new PC should be at least twice as powerful as a 2 years old PC which it replaces. Comparative tests have shown ZERO improvement in execution times.
Why should your new computer be at least twice as powerful as a 2 years old PC?
Erwin: The tests done so far involve extensive floating point calculations and DB I/O (calculating the area of parcels, creating shapes for some 4000 polygons and doing the I/O for ORACLE). DB connection is done via ORACLE 11g2 (with latest patches). OS is XP 32 prof. SP3. Microstaton XM in the latest download version is used.
The tests done so far involve extensive floating point calculations and DB I/O (calculating the area of parcels, creating shapes for some 4000 polygons and doing the I/O for ORACLE). DB connection is done via ORACLE 11g2 (with latest patches). OS is XP 32 prof. SP3. Microstaton XM in the latest download version is used.
4000 polygons doesn't seem like a lot of work, but database I/O would seem a possible bottleneck. I/O is mostly integer, so floating point performance may be irrelevant.
Is Oracle running on the same computer as MicroStation, or via a network connection? If it's on the same computer you should set the Windows processor affinity so they are running on different cores.
MicroStation, like most desktop applications, is mostly single-threaded (except for 3D rendering, which is not what you are doing). That single thread runs on a single processor. Of your 8 cores, 7 are not being used by MicroStation, and never will be.
Erwin: The programs in question have been developed over almost 10 years and the company who is doing this says it would be difficult to isolate the relevant code so that it could be tested meaningfully in another environment.
The programs in question have been developed over almost 10 years and the company who is doing this says it would be difficult to isolate the relevant code so that it could be tested meaningfully in another environment.
Are the programs in question running in Windows or on MicroStation? Can't the developer run a performance profile analysis on their code? There are tools for Windows that show processor, memory, I/O performance per process.
Regards, Jon Summers LA Solutions
MicroStation actually does take advantage of advancements in hardware (and software... like today's 64-bit Windows when run on a 64-bit CPU). Granted, it does not take advantage of all the advancements, but not all of them really make sense to take advantage of. I am sure you are aware of this, but there are many, many factors that come into play when you look at "performance" of a computer. From a practical perspective, when you get a computer with a CPU that is (at least on paper) X times faster than what you had, you are never going to see an X times improvement in performance. Similarly, two processors on one computer will never give you a doubling of "speed", four processors will not give you quadruple performance, etc. Other things like the amount of physical memory, the OS that you are using, your network, graphics subsystem (including drivers, VRAM, settings, etc.), hard disk, 32-/64-bit CPUs, etc. all play part -- and that is just the hardware. Then when you take into account things like what sort(s) of data you are accessing, other applications that are being used (you mention a 10-year old program?), system programs and processes running in the "background" (like anti-virus/malware/spyware software) , etc. those all contribute, too. One thing that I did (back when I was involved in computer purchasing decisions) was to request evaluation units -- try-before-you-buy style. That really helped in determining how different systems ACTUALLY performed in the environment I worked in, since there are so many different parameters involved.
All that said, if you could provide more detail about the sorts of things noted above, there might be some other suggestions for you to consider.
Erwin,
You didn't say whether you were running a single or dual screens on your new computer. In addition to the myriad of variables that Phil previously mentioned, if you are running dual screens, there is one other setting that is a complete performance killer. Many of our GIS power users and some of our CAD users were complaining about how ArcGIS and Microstation were running so slowly, even with our new , very high-end computers. Most of my Microstation users that I had set up were not experiencing these same slowdowns. It was not until we ran Bentley's Graphics Benchmark test on all of our computers did we see a pattern develop. While RAM and VRAM memory, the model of nVidia graphics card and the number of CPU processors all made a difference in performance, the biggest culprit that killed performance was whether we had a single desktop spanned across both screens or had the screens configured independently of one another. Those of us who had no performance problems had our desktop spanned across both screens ( resolution 2560 x 960 , screen # 1a and # 1b ). Our performance numbers were 8x to 10x faster than the secondary monitor of those whose displays were configured independently ( resolution 1280 x 960 on each, screen # 1 and # 2 ). Raster images and multiple layer repaints in GIS and rendering and 3D model manipulation, usually done on the right hand screen ( usually screen # 2 ) were painfully slow. Performance on screen # 1 was usually much better. When we changed their independent screen setup to a horizontal span setup, this performance penalty disappeared. Just remember to reconfigure your dialog boxes to open in the middle of one monitor or the other or they will now open spanned across the "gutter" between the two monitors. Very annoying. Hope this helps......
Jim