Why do games run about 200% faster on my Palm IIIxe compared to my Palm Pilot?

Graviton!!! Long time I don't see this game. I used to play it (along with all the Seimitsu Software games) on my original Pilot with PalmOS 1.0.7. I'm not completely sure but I think that this software was made in assembly language, and so it has some speed differences from processor to processor, probably because the EZ cpu needs less cycles to execute the same instruction. These were the first apps ever made for pilot handhelds

Confirming that it was made in assembly language: "All titles written by Julian Scott, in assembly language using Darrin Massena's Pila assembler"
http://web.archive.org/web/20040218003727/http://www.seimitsu.demon.co.uk/pilotprogs.htm

This is weird, I got the Palm Pilot Pro today and the same games on it run EXACTLY at the same speed as the Palm IIIxe.

Can anyone explain this? Now the OS and CPU are the same, yet speed is 200% slower on the Palm Pilot Personal, is it possible the Personal runs at 8 Mhz? The specs I saw online say 16.

Thanks


Edited by aab 2012-08-21 5:43 PM

Another strange issue, SubHunt gives an error saying it needs Palm OS 2.0 or more, but it has the 2.0.5 update (I guess the desktop software puts it automatically). My assumption is that it's looking for "2.0" which "2.0.5" doesn't match. I tried to remove 2.0.5 hoping SubHunt would then run but I can't remove it.

Does anyone know if it's the 2.0.5 update causing the problem? If so I can try the HotSync software that came on the CD (rather than a modern version I got online) which hopefully doesn't have the 2.0.5 update.

I'm quite sure I remember having SubHunt on my PalmPilot so I guess it's either the update or a bad version of the app.

Thanks


Edited by aab 2012-08-21 7:06 PM

Is it possible this is a Palm Pilot pro that was built later (after all the box was still sealed in 2012) and that they started putting the EZ processor in the last batches of Palm Pilot Pros? But didn't the EZ processor require the entire motherboard to be different?

It's just weird that all our theories about the speed difference (CPU vs OS) all seem to have been proven wrong now.

Know won nose?

I had forgotten to mention, the Palm Pilot Personal also couldn't connect to the desktop at higher speeds like 115k, 56k, and I think even 39k or whatever wouldn't connect. Only 19k or less would establish a connection.

Is it possible the CPU has some sort of defect causing it to run at half speed?


Edited by aab 2012-08-28 7:54 AM

I think what it all boils down to is improvements in both the processor and the operating system as the generations increase.

Rick

You seem to have missed the following post:



In other words:

Palm Pilot Personal
16 Mhz CPU
POS 2.0.5
Games run at: 50% speed

Palm Pilot Professional
16 Mhz CPU
POS 2.0.5
Games run at: 100% speed

Palm IIIxe
16 Mhz EZ CPU
POS 4.0
Games run at: 100% speed

The 2 that don't run at the same speed have exactly the same OS and CPU, so that theory is proven wrong (unless it really isn't the same CPU or some sort of defect).


Edited by aab 2012-08-29 5:26 AM

The most noticeable difference between all three Palm Pilots as found on their datasheet is the RAM amount:

Palm Pilot Personal
16 Mhz CPU
POS 2.0.5
Games run at: 50% speed
Palm Pilot Personal RAM capacity: 0.5 MiB

Palm Pilot Professional
16 Mhz CPU
POS 2.0.5
Games run at: 100% speed
Palm Pilot Professional RAM capacity: 1.0 MiB

Palm IIIxe
16 Mhz EZ CPU
POS 4.0
Games run at: 100% speed
Palm IIIxe RAM capacity: 8.0 MiB


Also, a datasheet about the MC68EZ328 Dragonball CPU and a datasheet for MC68328 if you would like to read more about them.

Edited by lotec 2012-08-29 8:09 AM

RAM doesn't affect processing speed, plus both the Palm Pilot Pro and Palm IIIxe run at EXACTLY the same speed, yet the Palm IIIxe has 800% more RAM, so that theory doesn't explain it either. In any case even the Palm Pilot Pro with less free RAM than the on Personal is still twice as fast.


Edited by aab 2012-08-29 9:15 AM

Yes, you are correct that RAM does not affect processing speed.

A larger amount of RAM will allow more application data to be processed more sufficiently, since the information initially passes through the random access memory. More RAM enables applications or games to run with increased stability.

Yes but stability and speed aren't the same, and as I said before Palm OS really can only access as much RAM as is still free, therefor it is possible to create the situation where the Palm Pro has less free RAM than the Palm Personal. Even configured this way so the personal has much more free RAM than the Pro, the Pro is still faster, so more RAM can't be the reason either.

I've also done 2 major RAM upgrade on my PC, even going from 2 GB to 8 GB and it made no improvement in performance whatsoever, so much so that I returned it for a refund and to this day still only have 2 GB RAM. However, I did replace my hard drive with an SSD and that literally made at least a 10 000% improvement in speed (things that literally used to take 5-15 minutes now execute in 0-5 seconds) and the computer hasn't slowed down the least bit in the 1.5 years I had this new SSD.

It's mostly a myth that more RAM makes a computer faster, this can only be true in very specific conditions such as a severe lack of RAM and slow hard drive. The hard drive is the single most important determining factor in the speed of a computer and the reason is obvious: It's by FAR the slowest part in a computer. While every other computer part can easily process gigabytes per second, a very high speed hard drive drive will only give out 100 MB/Sec and that's in absolutely perfect conditions, it's normally far slower. That's why replacing my hard drive with an SSD (which handles 550 MB/Sec virtually all the time) that is almost as fast as RAM allows my computer to run at mind boggling speeds while with everything identical but the SSD I used to take 1-5 minutes to load Windows calculator, it's now instant, all that changed is I replace my hard drive with an SSD (and even restored my hard drive image to the SSD so it wasn't even a clean install).


Edited by aab 2012-08-29 8:35 PM