Slow screen redraw

Slow screen redraw

• Rohit Nayak

   

  I'm a little excited. I did make a few optimizations, ones that I really do not think are important AND I built it release mode and NGEN'ed it. It worked incredibly well. Startup is normal and those colors just roar onto my screen.

  Don't forget the JIT slows you in the beginning and this where you get the largest gains by Ngening!

  The NGEN command batch file looked like this:

  windir%\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\ngen /delete Test2.exe
  %windir%\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\ngen test2.exe Test2.exe
  %windir%\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\ngen test2.exe /show

  For those who are not familiar with Ngen here is a reference:

  http://msdn.microsoft.com/msdnmag/issues/06/05/CLRInsideOut/default.aspx

  Please note: I have a pretty fast machine.

  
  
  

• istrasci

  Here is what I have....

  Public Class Form1< xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

      Protected size1 As New Size(80, 50)

      Protected size2 As New Size(40, 15)

      Protected point1 As Point = New Point(50, 30)

      Protected point2 As Point = New Point(5, 30)

   

      Private Sub Form1_Load(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles Me.Load

         

          Me.Visible = False

          Me.Cursor = Cursors.WaitCursor

          Dim p As Panel

          Dim t As Label

          Dim y, x As Integer

          Me.Size = New Size(1063, 910)

   

          Dim switch As Boolean

   

          For x = 0 To 12

   

              For y = 0 To 16

                  p = New Panel

                  p.Parent = Me

                  p.Size = size1

                  p.Name = "p" & x & y

                  p.Location = New Point(81 * x, 51 * y)

   

                  If switch Then

                      p.BackColor = Color.Red

                      switch = False

                  Else

                      p.BackColor = Color.Blue

                      switch = True

                  End If

                  t = New Label

                  t.BackColor = Color.White

                  t.Size = size2

                  t.Text = "test"

                  t.Parent = p

                  t = New Label

                  t.BackColor = Color.White

                  t.Location = point1

                  t.Size = size2

                  t.Parent = p

                  t.Text = "test2"

                  t = New Label

                  t.BackColor = Color.White

                  t.Location = point2

                  t.Size = size2

                  t.Parent = p

                  t.Text = "test3"

              Next

              Application.DoEvents()

          Next

          Me.Visible = True

          Me.Cursor = Cursors.Default

   

      End Sub

   

   

  
  
  

• Craig Humphrey

  Hi there, thanks for your input, the (setstyle) method was (after some initial investigation) an attempt to fix the issue.

  But the issue is exactly the same whether I use Me.SetStyle / or just Setstyle / or leave out the Setstyle lines all together.

  
  

• Tejas Zaveri

  Renee, I tried you modified code on my old, slow P4 3.0Ghz system and it was as slow as as the original............for me. Not too sure why. I just woke up a couple hours ago. Still need more coffee!! I agree that with so many controls being drawn on the screen it is always going to be slow. GDI+ is probably the best way to work with this. And another is to split the number of controls up over more than one form. I doubt that a user can view this many controls on a single form easily and be able to make effective use of them. If this is to monitor some sort of input from an external device or other function, I would , as I said, split them up, add some kind of notification on the main form , make the form flash or something, when a control on the other form needs some sort of attention.

  james

  aka:Trucker

  
  

• ygermain

  Your loops begin with 1 which you don't see much of in Dot Net. A Next is all that's required at the end of a For statement.

  13 * 17 is 221. Your creating 221 of these controls in that loop not to mention the panels they are in. that's a lot of work. And they don't update until the end. Try... putting an Application.DoEvents outside the inner loop. I wouldn't think this would do anything, but it's still a good test.

  
  
  

• Igor K.

  Here you go, much faster and not as annoying to the user:

  Private Sub Form1_Load(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles Me.Load

  Me.Visible = False

  Me.Cursor = Cursors.WaitCursor

  Dim p As Panel

  Dim t As Label

  Dim y, x As Integer

  Dim switch As Boolean

  'Me.SetStyle(ControlStyles.UserPaint, True)

  'Me.SetStyle(ControlStyles.AllPaintingInWmPaint, True)

  'Me.SetStyle(ControlStyles.DoubleBuffer, True)

  'Me.SetStyle(ControlStyles.UserPaint, True)

  'Me.SetStyle(ControlStyles.AllPaintingInWmPaint, True)

  'Me.SetStyle(ControlStyles.DoubleBuffer, True)

  'Me.UpdateStyles()

  For x = 1 To 13

  For y = 1 To 17

  p = New Panel

  p.Parent = Me

  p.Width = 80

  p.Height = 50

  p.Name = "p" & x & y

  p.Location = New Point(81 * x, 51 * y)

  If switch Then

  p.BackColor = Color.Red

  switch = False

  Else

  p.BackColor = Color.Blue

  switch = True

  End If

  t = New Label

  t.BackColor = Color.White

  t.Width = 40

  t.Height = 15

  t.Parent = p

  t.Text = "test"

  t = New Label

  t.BackColor = Color.White

  t.Location = New Point(50, 30)

  t.Width = 40

  t.Height = 15

  t.Parent = p

  t.Text = "test2"

  t = New Label

  t.BackColor = Color.White

  t.Location = New Point(5, 30)

  t.Width = 40

  t.Height = 15

  t.Parent = p

  t.Text = "test3"

  Next y

  Application.DoEvents()

  Next x

  Me.Visible = True

  Me.Cursor = Cursors.Default

  End Sub

  I set the form to not visible in the Form_Load event and then a Wait cursor. I then commented out the SetStyle stuff and at the end of the inside loop, I used Renee's suggestion and set Application.DoEvents() and then after the controls were drawn to the form, I set the form's visiable property back to True and the cursor to Default.

  Works pretty fast compared to the code you posted.

  james

  aka:Trucker

  
  

• Weidong Ding

  Please ignore my remark about SetStyle(), that's not the problem. With so many controls, the form will always be a dog. To really speed it up, implement a Paint event handler and just draw the squares and text with the Graphics class. It will take a fraction of second.
  
  
  
  

• notjosh

  Lets think practically: That's a lot of controls...yes, yes, they may be necessary, but if the user is going to have to deal with all those controls it's going to take the user a good few minutes to deal with them: the second or so to draw them isn't an issue.

  These are very complex controls - a button isn't just a button anymore (especially not a windows 3.1 button - and wow: Windows 3.1 was blazing fast on a Pentium II). It's a complex rendering. Unfortunately, cool software features always stays ahead of hardware capability (Transprency in forms is really cool, but you know, when I want to get work done, I really could care less about the shadowing and being able to see 'through' my work - I've stopped using the opacity in forms :) however, used appropriately, it works - i.e. breaking on errors in the VS IDE)

  If speed is an issue, you will have to sacrifice the convenience (of the buit in controls): use GDI+ to draw your controls, it'll be (relatively) fast. By using GDI+ you will be controlling exactly the features you need in the graphical representation. I worry about speed constantly, but appropriately: if speed actually brings something to the table, then spend the time. If it needs to get done tomorrow, then don't worry about it.

  Actually, I tend to use such things as a rule of thumb: if the redraw rate of the screen is slowing down, then the form is too complicated.

  
  
  

• MichaelJosten

  Ummm, Ken, this sounds great... but I don't see a suspend and resume update. I do a suspend and resume layout. It looks a tiny bit slower to me.

  
  
  

• Mark Durley

  Hey Trucker!!!

  I'm sure mileages will vary.... and my system is only 3.2 Ghz but it's hyper threaded which really does make a difference.

  I think my large gains came from Ngenning. However, I agree with what you and say also.

  There is no disagreement there.

  
  
  

• AndrewBadera

  The reason your form is slow is that everytime you add a control to the form the form redraws itself. For instances like this I would call me.suspendupdate (prevents form from redrawing itself) when you start adding the controls and me.resumeupdate (allows form to redraw itself) after the controls are added so the form only redraws itself once.
  
  
  

• arvas

  wow trucker....

  I fixated upon the loops and overlooked the set styles... but a form should not be visible until either it finishes the load routine or until it executes its first Application.Doevents.

  But way to go!!!

  
  
  

• Toni Leitao - MS

  Without actually trying it, I'm going to say that "Me.SetStyle" is your problem. When you change the "style" of a Windows control in .NET, you're asking it to create a completely new version of the control. You can see that by stepping through the code and paying attention to the Handle property. You'll probably see that .NET is actually creating a completely new version of the Windows control. That's expensive. Avoid that by designing the control the way you want it...
  
  
  
  

• zlobish

  Thanks, but, it still draws slower than it should. I think the problem is in the loops. And I believe that the code can be trimmed down to make it faster. But, right now, I'm too sleepy to mess with it enough to do anything constructive. Have a good night!

  james

  aka:Trucker

  
  
• Slow screen redraw