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From: @RUTGERS.ARPA:TLI@USC-ECLB.ARPA
Newsgroups: net.works
Subject: assembly v.s. HOL
Message-ID: <1731@topaz.ARPA>
Date: Tue, 23-Apr-85 01:03:00 EST
Article-I.D.: topaz.1731
Posted: Tue Apr 23 01:03:00 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 24-Apr-85 02:22:09 EST
Sender: daemon@topaz.ARPA
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.
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From: Tony Li <Tli@Usc-Eclb>

    From: terak!doug at topaz.arpa (Doug Pardee)

    I was wondering when someone was going to point out how today's
    faster CPUs make up for the overhead of using an HLL.

    I took that ol' Ackerman function and ran some benchmarks.  I
    compiled it using VAX/UNIX 4.2BSD "cc -O" and ran it on our VAX
    11/750.  To compute "acker(3,6)" ten times required 62.2 seconds.  I
    then rewrote it into Z-80 assembler.  The same computation takes 18.8
    seconds on a 4 MHz Z-80A.  (Yes, it got the same answer:
    acker(3,6)=509).

    So, moving up from a Z-80A to a VAX 11/750, the program only takes
    3.3 times as long when coded in C.  Or looked at another way, the
    overhead of using C code can bring a VAX down below the performance
    level of a Timex/Sinclair 1000.

Or, drawing another conclusion, "cc -O" under 4.2 is only a poor to
mediocre compiler.

Cheers, 
Tony ;-)