Slow opening / Slow unpacking start / Slow closing

[swenak]

Hi, I have latest version 11.71 and I have problem with speed of opening PA and with starting unpacking via context menu.

When I open PA directly, or opening ZIP file, it is about 3-5 seconds to open PA (and windows is not opened in one step, first I can see menus and then window wrame). When I unpacking zip file (few files in archive, or only one file), it is about 1 second to open window and start unpacking. Closing PA is slowly too (1second, not instant, first is cleared files list, next is closed window). Version 2009 was faster.

With other applications I dont have problems, PA is slowly opened than Word, Excel, Outlook 2007, Firefox, etc.

I use Win7 Pro 32, 4GB RAM DDR3, SSD drive, CPU Intel C2D 1.86Ghz, WinAERO is ON.

[spwolf]

what antivirus are you using?

[swenak]

I dont use any online antivirus.

[spwolf]

how do you mean online? You mean you have no antivirus at all?

[swenak]

I mean, that I dont have antivirus, that still scan files, that are opened, edite, saved or so, this can slowing down file operation performance. For on demand scaning I use ESET NOD32, but this problems I have after clear installation of Win7Pro. I dont have virus.

[spwolf]

Try deleting your HKCU\Software\PowerArchiver key and not registering PowerArchiver again… just run it like that, default… is it any faster?

[swenak]

Deleted PowerArchiver and PowerArchiverInt. Speed I mean is same (now asking me for registration, so it is not “exact”).

[spwolf]

it should not be that slow, what version of nod32 are you using, antivirus or smartsecurity?

we had an issue year ago when KAV was slowing down PA exit even when PA was whitelisted and on access scanner was not running.

PA 2011 should be a bit faster, but not sure if it will solve your problem since we dont see it being so slow here.

[swenak]

I use NOD32 (nod SS), but portable, so, is not installed.

[spwolf]

we can send you PA2011 alpha to see if it is better, might be…

[gan]

I always been having the same problems as described by swenak using PA. It’a a lot slower to open the application than other similar applications. Like swenak also said Word, Excel and other applications i would except to be slower is faster to launch. Using the toolbar instead of the ribbons make it a bit faster.

My computer is Intel 2GHz Extreme Quad Core, 8gb RAM and Intel SSD so the slowness is acceptable. My Second computer with a slower CPU, 4gb or RAM and a HDD PA is annoyingly slow.

-gan

[swenak]

Hi, OK, please, give me link and I can try it. If I can help with some registry export, or other informations, I will help you.

[spwolf]

@gan:

I always been having the same problems as described by swenak using PA. It’a a lot slower to open the application than other similar applications. Like swenak also said Word, Excel and other applications i would except to be slower is faster to launch. Using the toolbar instead of the ribbons make it a bit faster.

My computer is Intel 2GHz Extreme Quad Core, 8gb RAM and Intel SSD so the slowness is acceptable. My Second computer with a slower CPU, 4gb or RAM and a HDD PA is annoyingly slow.

-gan

you mean it is fast on your fast computer, much slower on your slow? If you see differences in different modes, such as when you have classic toolbar without explorer mode, then you should also be able to see improvement in PA 2011.

[gan]

@spwolf:

you mean it is fast on your fast computer, much slower on your slow? If you see differences in different modes, such as when you have classic toolbar without explorer mode, then you should also be able to see improvement in PA 2011.

No i mean slow it’s on the fast computer, but even worse of the slower computer. On the fast computer the slowness isn’t that big of a problem, but it would be crazy if the requirements for such a program is a top quad core CPU, 8gb ram and a SSD. The slower computer is still a decent computer, but with a CPU that is a bit older, less RAM and without a SSD it’s slower of course. I’m glad to hear there are improvements in PA 2011 with regards to the speed.

-gan

[spwolf]

depends on how fast is it on your fast computer? Also make sure you turn off explorer view and modern toolbar to make it faster. If it has to check files on the hard-drive, obviously it is slower.

so how fast does it load? On my old laptop it does it under 1.5s, with PA 2010.

[gan]

On the fast computer it takes about 3s for PA to start. I don’t have PA installed on the fast computer at the moment so did this check some time ago. There might have been some minor updates in the meantime to make powerarchiver a bit faster. WinRAR and WinZip is less than a second on the fast computer so hard to time and Excel is less than 2s. On the slower computer it takes about 5s to start powerarchiver and i’m using the current version there.

I always noticed that PA been the slowest to open of the compression software i been using. Since i receive a lot of compressed documents this affect me more than how fast the compression engine is. For the compression i find PA to be really fast compared to others. I also see what is already described where part of the GUI seems to load after the main frame open while WinZip/WinRAR open in a snap.

And yes turning of those features help a bit, but i really would like to use them. I use explorer view and the ribbon for WinZip as well without any issues. I also use explorer view for WinRAR even if WinRAR do not have ribbons.

-gan

[Mili]

do you have a floppy disk installed on this computer with windows 7?
Things you are describing sound familiar to a situation I had.
When installed W7, for some reason it had a floppy disk registered and was showing it in Windows Explorer.
Consequently, it slowed down PowerArchvier as PA had to check it on various occasions, which slowed it down.
I disabled the floppy drive in Windows and it didn’t show at all, now PA is very fast.

[Socrates]

I had the same experience. Once I disabled the floppy (which I never use anyway) I was fine.

Unless my memory serves me ill (a distinct possibility) this did not happen when I started using Win7. The phenomenon appeared only after a PA update 2-3 months ago.

[gan]

For me one of the computers is a laptop and do not have a floppy drive at all. The other one is a desktop and might have a floppy….actully not sure since i never use floppy and if it’s there i never used it.

-gan

[Mili]

Gan,
regardless if you physically have a floppy or not, please check if windows 7 is detecting/showing a floppy drive on your system.
You can do that by simply opening Windows Explorer and taking a look at all of your drives listed, is there a floppy drive listed there?(regardless if you actually have one or not)

[gan]

Thank you Mili, i checked both the desktop and laptop, but neither of them had a floppy icon under computer. I also checked device manager and did select to show hidden devices, but no floppy listed there as well.

gan

[swenak]

Hi,

I dont have flopy drive, I disable SD card slot, I switch to standard view of PA and here is video (is not public, only for you).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fZMeVHuG45U

Peter

PS: Yes, it is latest Air and NO, it is not virtualisation, it is native using of W7 on MBA and NO, I dont use dual boot, only W7.

[spwolf]

well I can tell you now that PA 2011 will be indeed slightly faster for you - for instance, that small “pause” when in shell, will be gone because we improved our keycheck by 0.3-0.5 seconds. So in your test, shell should be “instant” in the future, when everything is cached.

Main PA will be also faster by same 0.3-0.5 seconds as well, although it might be less noticeable because overall it is slower to open than shell.

Slowness is not due to what people usually think - skins or some other fancy features like backup, burner, ftp or any of that. We load all of that dynamically, so nothing is loaded during startup.

Where “slowness” comes from is due to the fact that we have to use custom controls in order to add full unicode support to application (which is essential), and thats where major difference is between PA 2007 for instance and any version after that.

For instance, PA 2007 will load in 1 sec, PA 2010 in 1.6s and PA 2011 in 1.3 seconds, on the same computer, and it is all due to that unicode support which requires slower controls.

After we are done with 2011, we will start process of migrating to newer version of Delphi, which should bring speed back to PA 2007 levels because unicode is built in and we can get rid of some custom controls, but that requires a huge amount of work and might bring some bugs of it own, since we have to rewrite some major parts of PowerArchiver.

[spwolf]

p.s. that SSD certainly speeds things up!

[spwolf]

email us at support at conexware dot com to get access to alpha which you can test…

As I said, it is 0.3s-0.5s speed up on very fast computers, and possible a lot of speed up on VERY old systems, but I wonder if it will be noticed on average computer.

Shell is definetly noticable, since there is not slight delay that is there in PA 2010.

On my own computer, 1.45s for PA 2011, 1.8s for PA 2010, with AV running.