Slow performance w/LO calc

English Applications
1

I’m having serious performance problems with LibreOffice calc. It can take up to a minute to load large files (>100KB), and even with small files there are long delays switching tabs or resizing windows. I’ve reset Undo to 20 steps from the default 100, disabled Java, and there’s a slight but not significant improvement. calc doesn’t provide any information in the terminal,

> localc
>

This is a new system running oS 13.1, GNOME & KDE, 32GB RAM, AMD FX 8-core 3.8GHz. The old system, with 13.1 and 4GB RAM, didn’t give me this problem. I’m using LibreOffice 4.2.5.2 from the LO stable repo, but the official version was also having these problems. Calculations are no more complex than some sumifs. Can anyone think of possible causes of this?

2

On 2014-07-20 04:26, chief sealth wrote:

> This is a new system running oS 13.1, GNOME & KDE, 32GB RAM, AMD FX
> 8-core 3.8GHz. The old system, with 13.1 and 4GB RAM, didn’t give me
> this problem. I’m using LibreOffice 4.2.5.2 from the LO stable repo, but
> the official version was also having these problems. Calculations are no
> more complex than some sumifs. Can anyone think of possible causes of
> this?

Are you running in failsafe mode, perhaps? It uses one CPU core only.

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.

(from 13.1 x86_64 “Bottle” (Minas Tirith))

3

Not from what I can tell. It’s the same if I open files in nautilus, dolphin, or within LO. Where’s the setting for this?

4

If you were in failsafe mode you would surely know it.
And FYI, multi core CPU’s are most often running on one unless you are giving the system a need for more

5

If you want useful info on your system, I suggest installing
kio_sysinfo

Logout and in

Open konqueror and in the URL bar type
sysinfo:/

Upon opening check the number of cores running.
Very shortly the number will clock down to a minimal amount that reflects the overall load

6

On 2014-07-20 04:56, chief sealth wrote:

>> Are you running in failsafe mode, perhaps? It uses one CPU core only.
>>
>
> Not from what I can tell. It’s the same if I open files in nautilus,
> dolphin, or within LO. Where’s the setting for this?

It is a boot option, so you select it on grub.

You find out by looking, for instance, at the top few lines of “top” in
a terminal: when you press “1”, you get a display of how each core is
loaded. If you get only one entry, then you know.

You can also look at the contents of “/proc/cpuinfo”, or searching in
“/var/log/messages” for the last line that contains “Kernel command line”

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.

(from 13.1 x86_64 “Bottle” (Minas Tirith))

7

Ah, I thought you might be referring to a setting in LO. I haven’t had any reason to boot into failsafe.

8

All cores are active on the meters. Logging in, sysinfo:// seems to confirm this:

CPU Information
Processor (CPU):   AMD FX(tm)-8300 Eight-Core Processor
  Speed:  3,300.00 MHz
  Cores:  8
9

On 2014-07-20 19:16, chief sealth wrote:

> Ah, I thought you might be referring to a setting in LO. I haven’t had
> any reason to boot into failsafe.

I guess so, or you would know :slight_smile:

But I have seen it happen by accident. I also remember a case here, new
install, normal boot apparently, where only one core was running…

Some people try that mode to solve a video problem, and then stay in
that mode. Later they complain of somewhat slow machine, compared to
Windows on same machine…

Sorry, it is was the only think I could think about to justify your
problem. I’ll try thinking something else… but for the moment, no ideas.

On another age, I’d ask if you had bought the coprocesor cpu (x87) and
installed it properly. But as far as I know, all x86 cpus include its
functionality on the main chip, since… well, a decade or more.

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.

(from 13.1 x86_64 “Bottle” (Minas Tirith))

10

It’s the factory CPU. I hope it’s installed correctly!

11

I am quite sure the CPU only installs into the socket in the “correct” orientation.
So physically you should be OK, but then there is logically (drivers, etc).

LO is a JAVA based app, I believe. Any other Java apps misbehaving?

Perhaps search for and run a Java performance test App?

Any reason to suspect video driver? Does the FX device have an on-board video device?

12

On 2014-07-21 01:06, cmcgrath5035 wrote:
>
> I am quite sure the CPU only installs into the socket in the “correct”
> orientation.

Sorry, I have the feeling that you two confused my meaning because,
perhaps, you are too young, or because I did not express myself
correctly :slight_smile:

Ok, a bit of ancient computer history :slight_smile:

The original 8086 procesor could not do real number math (a real in this
context is basically a number with decimals, actually, fractionals
(well, no, not really)). This was common for all processors at the time:
real math had to be done in code, the cpu only dealt with integers.

But there was another chip, optionally installed, called “math
coprocessor”, id number 8087, which could be connected on the board, and
then, if the software included code for it, was used to make those math
operations in hardware, and much faster.

So, we had the 80287, 80387, 80487…

Around the appeareance of the Pentium the coprocesor was no longer a
separate optional chip, but was included in the main cpu chip. Everybody
benefited.

I don’t know which was the last x86 family cpu chip without hardware
floating math included, out of the box.

So what I commented was that, on another age, with these symptoms, I
would instantly suspect that the math coprocessor was not installed. But
as far as I know, that happening today would be impossible - unless
somebody does know about a CPU (x86 family) without floating point math
in the main core.

> LO is a JAVA based app, I believe. Any other Java apps misbehaving?

No, it is not java based at all. It is C or C++ compiled code.

It uses java for “external” additions such as the wizards. Just try,
remove java from your system and you will see that LO keeps working fine

  • except a few things, like the wizards.

> Any reason to suspect video driver? Does the FX device have an on-board
> video device?

That’s a possibility. There is a setting to disable hardware accel and
effects in LO, so try that.

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.

(from 13.1 x86_64 “Bottle” (Minas Tirith))

13

Hah; I well understood you Math co-processor comments.
BTW, before the 8086/8087, there was the 8008, which of course was preceded by the 4004.
I was actually commenting on ChiefStealth’s quick comment.

So I am incorrect about LO and Java, good to know.
Same true of Open Office, from which LO forked?
My Java comment really originates from what I thought I knew of OO.

I run oS 13.1/KDE on an AMD APU, which does include a video engine.
It took a bit for the driver situation to sort itself out in the early days of APU, but that is very old news.
Runs very well now with Radeon driver or proprietary
And I have lost track of FX progress.

14

On 2014-07-21 05:06, cmcgrath5035 wrote:
>
> Hah; I well understood you Math co-processor comments.
> BTW, before the 8086/8087, there was the 8008, which of course was
> preceded by the 4004.
> I was actually commenting on ChiefStealth’s quick comment.

Yes, I know, but he was talking about factory correct installation,
probably mistaken from what I said that the factory had correctly
installed the corresponding coprocesor - but today, that’s a non-issue :slight_smile:

> So I am incorrect about LO and Java, good to know.
> Same true of Open Office, from which LO forked?
> My Java comment really originates from what I thought I knew of OO.

Yes, same thing with OpenOffice, and with it’s predecessor Staroffice.

However, depending on your particular way of using it, java may be a
necessity, because you use a feature that is coded in java. The core is
not, but some things are.

It could be the issue with chief_sealth, perhaps if his files include
macros?

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.

(from 13.1 x86_64 “Bottle” (Minas Tirith))

15

On Sun, 20 Jul 2014 17:34:09 GMT, “Carlos E. R.”
<robin_listas@no-mx.forums.opensuse.org> wrote:

>
>On another age, I’d ask if you had bought the coprocesor cpu (x87) and
>installed it properly. But as far as I know, all x86 cpus include its
>functionality on the main chip, since… well, a decade or more.

Floating point was brought onchip for the 486. It has been onchip ever
since.

?-)

16

Hello,

Sorry that i take an old treath but it’s an old problem as well,
I use huges datas amount on my computer so i did install end 2012 an SSD to speed up my work, it did very well but some times later , it slows down very badly on saving datas (so i tried everything with my hardware, software config and so on without luck)
After the 4 SSD (because at the time it’s slows down, in the processus task i have an wait for io “attente accès disque”, and it’s not as bad with an hdd) without luck to solve this, i tried today some new Libroffice version 4.4 and 4.3.
With Opensuse13.1x64, and a asus gt620 the 4.4 hass graphics problem.
The LO 4.3 solves all my problems with slow downs !!!
After a short search i found out that the version 4.0 to 4.1 Libroffice have some big issues with big datas …
I think this is as well wats the real problem on this thread, lack of muturity of LO.
I hope Opensuse will update ther package in YAST for libreoffice soon because the problem coincided with (now i know) the update of libreoffice and not the SSD.
Best Regards.