If this is your first visit, be sure to check out the FAQ by clicking the link above. You may have to register before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages, select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below. |
|
|
Thread Tools | Display Modes |
#1
|
|||
|
|||
Pls confirm 2007 chart redraw is up to 10 times slower than 2003
I have complex charts, with many data points. The redraw time on my machine
in Excel 2003 (all updates for office and wxp installed) is 2-3 sec, which I consider extremely slow, so I was looking forward to an new chart engine with better speed from 2007, but am flabergasted at how slow 2007 is. Try this...create a line chart, 12 columns of 5000 points each. Put it imbeded in a worksheet. Tab to another worksheet, tab back, time the redraw. On my machine (3 ghz, 2gig ram), redraw time is 2-3 sec for all the lines to show up on the graph. In 2007, it takes a full minute! the graph looks better (lines are more clear), but wow, this redraw time is crazy! I created the graph in 2003, pulled it into 2007 and saved it as 2007.xlsm file type. I also have a graph with ~ 50 5k point lines, of which I hide most of them at any one time. This chart redraw in 2007 can go on for 5 minutes! (compared to 10-15 sec in 2003) Am I unaware of some setting to speed things up, or did MS realy make charts 10X slower to redraw? Best regards Larry |
#2
|
|||
|
|||
Pls confirm 2007 chart redraw is up to 10 times slower than 2003
Larry -
Keep in mind that you are not using Excel 2007. Unless you have been able to time-transport yourself into the future, you are actually using Excel 2007 Beta 2. And you should not expect that a Beta version is optimized for speed. - Mike www.mikemiddleton.com "larry godfrey" wrote in message ... I have complex charts, with many data points. The redraw time on my machine in Excel 2003 (all updates for office and wxp installed) is 2-3 sec, which I consider extremely slow, so I was looking forward to an new chart engine with better speed from 2007, but am flabergasted at how slow 2007 is. Try this...create a line chart, 12 columns of 5000 points each. Put it imbeded in a worksheet. Tab to another worksheet, tab back, time the redraw. On my machine (3 ghz, 2gig ram), redraw time is 2-3 sec for all the lines to show up on the graph. In 2007, it takes a full minute! the graph looks better (lines are more clear), but wow, this redraw time is crazy! I created the graph in 2003, pulled it into 2007 and saved it as 2007.xlsm file type. I also have a graph with ~ 50 5k point lines, of which I hide most of them at any one time. This chart redraw in 2007 can go on for 5 minutes! (compared to 10-15 sec in 2003) Am I unaware of some setting to speed things up, or did MS realy make charts 10X slower to redraw? Best regards Larry |
#3
|
|||
|
|||
Pls confirm 2007 chart redraw is up to 10 times slower than 20
Sorry for being too casual about the beta part...
However, I would not expect optimization for speed to handle a 10X slow down. I have run some additional tests using VBA for sheet calculations. If I calculate a singele row in a complex sheet inside vba, it takes 15! times longer in the 2007 beta vs 2003. The only time I see 2007 beta any better in speed compared to 2003 is in a workbook where 2003 dependency limit has been exceeded so 2003 has to do a full recalc while 2007 beta only does a "changed" recalc. Has anyone else done some speed tests? Best Regards Larry "Mike Middleton" wrote: Larry - Keep in mind that you are not using Excel 2007. Unless you have been able to time-transport yourself into the future, you are actually using Excel 2007 Beta 2. And you should not expect that a Beta version is optimized for speed. - Mike www.mikemiddleton.com |
#4
|
|||
|
|||
Pls confirm 2007 chart redraw is up to 10 times slower than 20
It's not just optimization. If you've used the various charting and graphics
modules much in 2007 Beta 2, you will have noticed that a lot of things are still a bit off. It's a combination of correcting the glitches, optimizing the internal processes, and who knows what else, that will improve the performance of the program. - Jon ------- Jon Peltier, Microsoft Excel MVP Tutorials and Custom Solutions http://PeltierTech.com _______ "larry godfrey" wrote in message ... Sorry for being too casual about the beta part... However, I would not expect optimization for speed to handle a 10X slow down. I have run some additional tests using VBA for sheet calculations. If I calculate a singele row in a complex sheet inside vba, it takes 15! times longer in the 2007 beta vs 2003. The only time I see 2007 beta any better in speed compared to 2003 is in a workbook where 2003 dependency limit has been exceeded so 2003 has to do a full recalc while 2007 beta only does a "changed" recalc. Has anyone else done some speed tests? Best Regards Larry "Mike Middleton" wrote: Larry - Keep in mind that you are not using Excel 2007. Unless you have been able to time-transport yourself into the future, you are actually using Excel 2007 Beta 2. And you should not expect that a Beta version is optimized for speed. - Mike www.mikemiddleton.com |
#5
|
|||
|
|||
Pls confirm 2007 chart redraw is up to 10 times slower than 20
Scott Rubble of microsoft was able to recreate my slow graphing with beta 2,
but has encouraging comments regarding optimization process: "With our recent performance improvements in charting, it renders much faster than in Beta 2. The upcoming release of Beta 2 TR should be a good indication of the actual performance you will see at RTM." So I am in "wait and see" mode! ) Heeeeres hoping! Larry |
#6
|
|||
|
|||
Pls confirm 2007 chart redraw is up to 10 times slower than 20
I have downloaded Office 2007 (Home & Student edition) today, and am appalled
at the very slow performance. It is so slow, it's unuseable. For example, if I try to delete a graph (to help speed Excel up), it delays by at least 20 secs, and a menu appears for about 1/2 second and then disappears again. Useless. David |
#7
|
|||
|
|||
Pls confirm 2007 chart redraw is up to 10 times slower than 20
"David Com" wrote: I have downloaded Office 2007 (Home & Student edition) today, and am appalled at the very slow performance. It is so slow, it's unuseable. David Thanks for confirming my findings, David. Even the new release, though faster, is unuseable for me too. Just make a graph with 50k data points and you will see what we mean. I had high hopes because of the optimization done for multiprocessors for speed enhancement, and I could use the larger number of available columns too, but once you add a large graph it slows to a crawl, even when just chnanging from tab with the graph to one without. My graphs take MINUTES to get their view generated in 2007, and only seconds in 2003. I have always thought of the graphics package for Excel to be a poorly executed add on, almost an after thought, awkward, limited, and slow. (Immagine having hide non-visible data points option in the tools/options, not in any menu list directly related to graphing for instance!). There are lots of non-excel scientific graphing packages that have much more flexibility and are much faster, but no good add-ins that I know of that use there own code rather than just using the Excel commands in fancy macros. I need to combine the flexibility of excel worksheets and vba with the graphing power of these scientific graphing packages. If any one knows of an add-in, even if I have to pay for it, that by-passes Excel graphics I would appreciate knowing about it. Happy New Year Larry |
#8
|
|||
|
|||
Pls confirm 2007 chart redraw is up to 10 times slower than 20
Larry,
To get Excel to have 1 million rows rather than 65K, they will have had to rewrite everything. My impression is that they have made a terrible job of it. Graphing is very important. I guess there is a remote possibility that the final release improves things. Microsoft will get a tremendous amount of bad press if it remains as it is now. I certainly wouldn't consider buying Office 2007 if it stays in it's current state. What is the point of 1 millions rows if Excel can't cope with 25K rows in a single axis Graph? (which is what I have, and it crawls) David |
#9
|
|||
|
|||
Pls confirm 2007 chart redraw is up to 10 times slower than 20
David
RTM charting is a 'little' better, but very much still to be improved (I am sure in v.next). Quoting the 1000000 rows (You didn't mention 16k columns) is something I believe Excel users, for it is they who demanded them, will rue the day they did. It's a limitation of current machine power (Generally available) and the tasks Excel is put to that make me very sceptical. Anything approaching the old limit of 65k, should IMHO, be in a database. Charting *will* get improved but is disappointing in this version. 1,000,000 rows with VLOOKUPs, SUMIFs, etc, I say... Be careful what you ask for.... (Not you specifically, just a sentiment) -- HTH Nick Hodge Microsoft MVP - Excel Southampton, England DTHIS www.nickhodge.co.uk "David Com" wrote in message news Larry, To get Excel to have 1 million rows rather than 65K, they will have had to rewrite everything. My impression is that they have made a terrible job of it. Graphing is very important. I guess there is a remote possibility that the final release improves things. Microsoft will get a tremendous amount of bad press if it remains as it is now. I certainly wouldn't consider buying Office 2007 if it stays in it's current state. What is the point of 1 millions rows if Excel can't cope with 25K rows in a single axis Graph? (which is what I have, and it crawls) David |
#10
|
|||
|
|||
Pls confirm 2007 chart redraw is up to 10 times slower than 20
Nick,
I am only a hobby user, so I am sure there will be far more demanding users than me. I use Excel to research ideas for my hobby, and charts help me visualise what is going on. As an example, I have 27K rows, and about 30 columns of raw data. A macro then creates another 30 rows. I may then sum various columns. I then create a new column with: average (d2:d101) and fill down the 27K rows, and display this single column as a chart. Excel2007 is VERY slow. Excel 2000 does it fine, and much faster. Obviously the average calculation could be optimised, but I want a tool that is easy to use, without having to think too hard (and possibly make mistakes). I believe I am using about 2 million cells, so if we assume 20bytes/cell, that gives 40MB. That doesn't sound excessive. If I open a chart (as above), it's slow to open in 2007. I can't right click the chart (or if I can the delay is about 20 secs). Sometimes (I don't know what I have done) I get a menu flash on the screen for about 1/2 sec, and it's gone again. It's impossible to use! I would describe it as "Not fit for purpose". I often like to delete sheets and move other sheets in to replace them. Excel 2007 won't allow this. It allows the command but then complains that the source (or is it destination) had too many rows or columns. WHY! I accept your comment about databases. However Excel is good for a quick experiment & chart. A database requires too much planning. I have done a bit of reading in the last day, and have discovered that Excel 2000 is only supposed to be able to have about 80MB of cells. My PC has about 700MB, but Excel 2000 appeared to be using it all. Is this correct? (I just kept filling cells with 1, and then looked at the Task Manager). Excel 2007 seemed to have similar limits (just more rows, and less columns). Both seemed to allow about 33 milion cells. Am I correct in assuming it is max row X max column which determines memory use? There are some scenarios where Excel 2000 does really struggle, and I had hoped 2007 would solve all my problems. I was hoping that with 1 million rows/16K columns, it would need much better internal algorithms. From what you are saying, it sounds like that wasn't possible. Is my best option to simply buy more RAM and/or a faster PC? My experiments suggest Excel 2003 won't help me. For my hobby, it's disappointing, but I'm sure I can find workarounds. However, serious professional users may be rather more upset. Most users have no idea how things like vlookup work, so they won't understand when the performance is poor. However, I think Microsoft could have helped themselves by adding an option which uses a sorted list, but requires an exact match. It would be a simply tweak to the existing algorithm, but allow users to use sorted lists more easily (I always want exact matches. I know you can do it using two sorted vlookups, but it should not be necessary!) David |
Thread Tools | |
Display Modes | |
|
|
Similar Threads | ||||
Thread | Thread Starter | Forum | Replies | Last Post |
QuickParts not a substitute for AutocorrectAutotext | Greg Gates | General Discussion | 16 | July 26th, 2006 05:24 PM |
Fan charts | Dean | Charts and Charting | 7 | May 30th, 2005 11:51 AM |
Productkey problem when installing office 2003 on network | Stefan Schreurs | Setup, Installing & Configuration | 1 | June 1st, 2004 11:16 PM |
Chart menu visible property | Sandy V | Charts and Charting | 8 | May 17th, 2004 01:39 PM |
Styles for chart | Debra Dalgleish | Charts and Charting | 1 | October 3rd, 2003 12:27 PM |