Windows and Computer Responsiveness

Seconds matter when it comes to computing and productivity

Every now and then I get a bit nostalgic for the days when my workaday computer had a nearly instantaneous response time.

That would be when that computer was a 6 MHz IBM PC/AT.

How could it have an instantaneous response time when it was several hundred times slower that the machine I’m using to write this blog entry? Because the software was designed to be fast and efficient. If I wanted a directory of files in a folder, it appeared like lightning. (Even faster when I hot-rodded that AT to run at 8 MHz with a faster crystal on the motherboard. )

Today, Windows 7 is all over the headlines, and one of the reasons people like it more than Vista is that it’s faster and more responsive. However, even Windows 7 on a state-of-the-art PC is a slug compared to my old AT running DOS. Does that matter? It turns out that it does.

Back in November 1982, an IBM researcher named Arvind Thadhani wrote a paper titled “The Economic Value of Rapid Response Time.” This paper challenged the conventional wisdom that improving computer response time past a second or two had no measurable impact on productivity. Thadhani’s work indicated that a programmer’s productivity improved dramatically – and non-linearly – when the system response time fell below one second. Heck, I wait several seconds sometimes just for Windows to enumerate the contents of a network folder.

My belief is that Thadhani was right, and the price we have paid for the huge overhead that Windows imposes is greater than we realize. Windows 7 is faster than Vista and we can all be glad about that. It’s still not anywhere near fast enough to enable us to work at our most productive. In that sense, at least, it’s not nearly as good as DOS!

• Microsoft
• arvind thadhani
• IBM
• responsiveness
• Server 2008
• system response time
• Windows 7