BC3 extremely slow to open file diffs

[faxedhead]

We used BC2 as our standard diff tool for some years and found no issues with performance. Then we moved to BC3 a few months back, and several people are now noticing that the time taken to view diffs between two files (coding files, .cs, .cpp etc.) has dramatically increased to > 5 seconds to get to a viewable diff. This can be reproduced by diffing two 1kb text files on a local HDD, so it is not network/source control related. This is of course an unacceptable amount of time and I'm sure is not the expected performance even with BC3's new features.

I tried disabling all the file formats, as suggested by Craig in this thread:

http://www.scootersoftware.com/vbull...ead.php?t=5828

But this has no impact on performance. By the way, it took AGES to uncheck each file format, since the UI would not respond for > 5 seconds before the checkbox would actually untick.

I installed BC2 again, and the file-comparion window opens instantly. I also tried WinMerge and DiffTool, and both programs opened file diffs instantly. Is there any way to diagnose/fix why BC3 is taking SO long to open file diffs?

OS: Windows 7, Windows XP

[Aaron]

Hello,

While BC3 can be a bit slower than BC2, the fact that you are having issues with check boxes surprises me. Those controls should be near-instantaneous, like any other program on your system. Do they behave that way if you launch BC3 and go straight to the options dialog without opening any files?

First bit of info: You can have BC2 and BC3 installed simultaneously on your system. They behave as separate programs, so you can use BC2 for day-to-day work while we troubleshoot BC3.

Would you be able to email us at [email protected] :
1) A copy of your Support package (Help menu -> Support; Export)
2) A pair of sample files.

[Aaron]

Hello,

If you disable your virus scan, do you see improvements in the checkboxes performance? It is possible another program is slowing down access to our settings.xml files (which are accessed when the checkboxes are checked, etc).

[faxedhead]

Disabling virus scan (Symantec) has no effect. Yes, on my machine, the checkboxes still take AGES to select/unselect even when you launch BC3 and go straight to the options dialog without opening any files. However, on a colleages machine (also Win7), the checkboxes respond normally. Ideally we wouldn't go back to BC2 since it doesn't have 3-way merge, but yes that is a temporary workaround. I have emailed you our support package and a pair of sample files as requested.

In the meantime, I will do some more tests to try and confirm behaviour on different machines. If there is anything else I can check/test let me know.

[Aaron]

Hello,

We received your email, and replied with a couple of additional troubleshooting steps. Something seems to be slowing down access to our settings files (clicking the checkboxes). One test was to perform a portable install to a USB device, and to your desktop, to see if either had performance improvements for you.