Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!uwvax!oddjob!ncar!ames!elroy!cit-vax!ucla-cs!korfhage
From: korfhage@CS.UCLA.EDU
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: What C compiler generates fastest code?
Message-ID: <14105@shemp.CS.UCLA.EDU>
Date: 2 Jul 88 02:42:26 GMT
Sender: news@CS.UCLA.EDU
Reply-To: korfhage@CS.UCLA.EDU (Willard Korfhage)
Organization: UCLA Computer Science Department
Lines: 21


  The subject line says it all: what C compiler generates the fastest code?
We just got Lightspeed C (v. 2.15), and someone in the group wrote a
numerical integration program and said it ran on a Mac II at 1/4 the speed
of an unloaded vax 11/750.  Quite disappointing, and a bit puzzleing.  A
Sun 3/280 is, if I recall correctly, a 20 Mhz 68020, and seems to run
several times faster than a 750.  A Mac II is a 16 Mhz 68020, and even
allowing for wait-states in memory access, one would not think that the
Mac II would run at only a fraction of the Vax's speed.  Perhaps it was
the heavy numerical calculations?

  We do a fair amount of simulation, and were thinking about getting a Sun
3/280 to replace our creaky old vax.  However, I put forth the idea of
spending the money on fast 68030 cards for our Mac IIs instead. This seems
to discredit the idea, although it is difficult to believe that such cards
would be hard pressed to keep up with a 750.

   Willard Korfhage

   ARPA : korfhage@cs.ucla.edu
   UUCP : {ucbvax,ihnp4,randvax,trwrb!trwspp,ism780}!ucla-cs!korfhage