Phoronix has published the results of its power and memory consumption tests for the four major Linux desktop environments. According to Phoronix, the tests were run on a customised Samsung NC10 netbook that featured an Intel Atom N270 processor, 2 GB of RAM and a 32 GB solid state drive (SSD). The GNOME, KDE, Xfce and LXDE desktops were tested and the results showed that the latest release of KDE SC uses significantly more memory and power to run compared to the other three.

In all tests, KDE 4.4.1 had both the highest minimal memory usage and highest average system memory usage, while LXDE 0.5 had the lowest. GNOME 2.29.91 and Xfce 4.6.1 fell between the two, with Xfce requiring less memory than GNOME. To test power consumption and represent light usage, Phoronix loaded the desktop, launched the default file manager, followed by the default web browser and navigated through each of the desktop menus. Phoronix found that KDE 4.4.1 consumed the most power at 14.1 watts, while Xfce (13.3 watts), GNOME (13.1 watts) and LXDE (12.9 watts) all used less.

Desktop Minimal Memory Memory for activity Power Usage KDE 4.4.1 449 MB 573 MB 14.1 Watts GNOME 2.29.91 381 MB 439 MB 13.1 Watts Xfce 4.6.1 324 MB 415 MB 13.3 Watts LXDE 0.5 293 MB 338 MB 12.9 Watts

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(crve)