Very Computer

by **Jonathan Fi** » Fri, 07 Feb 1992 04:12:49

I have a dBase IV application that runs a tad on the slow side. I'm running
on my 286 with 640K. My hard drive has a 28ms access time. So far my
databases are not very large (about 300 records), and I fear as my
databases get larger, the problem will worsen. I have heard that dBase
is quite slow, but I'm wondering if my computer is considerably underpowered.
Would a 386 or 486 help much? considerably? What about a hard drive with
an access time of 9ms?

If anyone with dBase experience would mind shedding some light on what
my requirements should be, I would appreciate it.
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Jonathan File Bell-Northern Research
<insert standard P.O. Box 3511, Station C
disclaimer here> Ottawa, Ontario

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by **Peter E. Wagn** » Fri, 07 Feb 1992 08:14:46

|>
|> I have a dBase IV application that runs a tad on the slow side. I'm running
|> on my 286 with 640K. My hard drive has a 28ms access time. So far my
|> databases are not very large (about 300 records), and I fear as my
|> databases get larger, the problem will worsen. I have heard that dBase
|> is quite slow, but I'm wondering if my computer is considerably underpowered.
|> Would a 386 or 486 help much? considerably? What about a hard drive with
|> an access time of 9ms?

All of these options would help considerably!

|>
|> If anyone with dBase experience would mind shedding some light on what
|> my requirements should be, I would appreciate it.

Your application is small, but dBase IV is a bit large for your
configuration. I think the easiest thing to do is to upgrade the
hardware:

- you can probably just get a new system board w/o buying a whole
new machine
- you can add a few megs of RAM
- you can get a faster hard drive (makes a big difference)
- you can do some RAM caching (you'll need more RAM)

You can try FoxPro. It should be faster than dBase IV, and I believe
it's compatible.

Another idea, if you don't really need the features of dBase IV, is to
buy Foxbase. It's relatively old now, and only provides dBase III+
compatibility, but it's small and fast, and will be plenty fast enough
on a 286 for your application. It's also very cheap now. I mention
this as a possibility, but it's really backtracking. There isn't much
that a 286 will run comfortibly these days, and software is getting
bigger and "slower" all the time. It's probably time to upgrade the
hardware.

Peter
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Brown University, Providence, RI 02912 uunet!brunix!pew
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by **Eric Wei** » Sat, 08 Feb 1992 23:46:02

>I have a dBase IV application that runs a tad on the slow side. I'm running
>on my 286 with 640K. My hard drive has a 28ms access time. So far my
>databases are not very large (about 300 records), and I fear as my
>databases get larger, the problem will worsen. I have heard that dBase
>is quite slow, but I'm wondering if my computer is considerably underpowered.
>Would a 386 or 486 help much? considerably? What about a hard drive with
>an access time of 9ms?

Yes, any faster machine (386 or 486) would help considerably, as you might
expect, since they are faster cpu's. Even if you can't afford a whole new
cpu, a fast disk is of primary importance, especially with big files. I doubt
that a real fast disk will show much benefit with a 300 record database,
however; dBase probably loads the whole thing into RAM anyway. With bigger
files, disk speed becomes very important. I know that with FoxPro, and I
think it might be safe to assume dBase, the more RAM the better. FoxPro tries
to load as much of the file into RAM as possible, making access to the data
extremely fast.

Quote:>If anyone with dBase experience would mind shedding some light on what
>my requirements should be, I would appreciate it.

My personal reccomendation would be to s*dBase and use FoxPro 2.0. It will
run much better on your current machine, and will blow dBase away on an
improved machine.

>--
> / / /
> / ___/_/_
> / ___ _____ ___ / /__ ___ _____
> / / ) / ) / ) / / ) / ) / )
> / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /
>(___/ (___/ / (__(___(__/ / (__(___(_ / (_
>-----------------------------------------------------------------
>Jonathan File Bell-Northern Research
> <insert standard P.O. Box 3511, Station C
> disclaimer here> Ottawa, Ontario

>-----------------------------------------------------------------

Eric
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University of Chicago -- Academic and Public Computing
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by **Cy Shust** » Sun, 09 Feb 1992 03:23:18

Instead of upgrading your hardware, you can try several options to
tune dBASE IV in your existing configuration. First, make sure you
have version 1.1. This version includes a disk cache, which will
improve performance on your existing hard disk. DBCACHE will use
either extended or expanded memory. Next, try adjusting the environment
variable DBHEAP. It controls the percentage of available memory that
is allocated to your .PRG; the rest is available for dBASE's overlays.
It defaults to 50. If you have a relatively small .PRG, try setting
DBHEAP to 35 or so; if your application is large, try numbers greater
than 50. Lastly, if you have enough memory for a RAM disk, you can
set the environment variable TMP or DBTMP to point to it; this controls
the location of dBASE's temporary files. These options are described
in the Getting Started manual, under Fine-Tuning Performance.

I second Peter's comments on hardware upgrades as well. Probably the
most cost effective one is additional memory.

--Cy--
Sr. Developer
Borland

by **Cy Shust** » Wed, 12 Feb 1992 03:09:39

>>I have a dBase IV application that runs a tad on the slow side. I'm running
>>on my 286 with 640K. <deletions>

>Yes, any faster machine (386 or 486) would help considerably, as you might
>expect, since they are faster cpu's. <deletions>

>My personal reccomendation would be to s*dBase and use FoxPro 2.0. It will
>run much better on your current machine <deletions>

I've heard anecdotal evidence that dBASE IV actually outperforms FoxPro 2.0
on some of the lower-end hardware (i.e. in 640K real mode). Does anyone
have any first hand experience?

--Cy--
Sr. Developer
Borland

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