Logos may perform more quickly on some computers than others, especially when using newer hardware. We are constantly working to improve performance on all computers. This article covers some steps you can take to improve performance for your particular setup in several areas such as:
Skip ahead to:
- Searches
- Guides
- Layouts
- Text Comparison Tool
- Information Tool
- Emphasis Options
- Visual Filters
- Notes and Highlights
- Hardware Upgrades
Optimize Scope of Your Searches
If you are experiencing performance issues when executing searches, it is worth checking if you are searching through more books than you need to.
In a Bible Search, for example, only searching your preferred Bible will produce results more quickly than searching all of your Bibles. You can select which Bibles you want to search by clicking the current selection (1) and choosing from the options shown (2):
The same principle applies for a Books Search, where you can choose to search a single book, a series or collection, or your entire library.
Optimize your Guides
Guides are a great way to quickly find a large amount of information for a given passage or topic.
Collapse Unused Sections
To optimize performance, it is recommended that you only open individual sections when you want to look at its information. Click a section header to collapse it, or right-click a section header and select Collapse All from the drop-down menu to collapse all of them.
Note: If you use the Collapse All option before closing a Guide, then you next time it is opened all the sections will be closed and you can then just open the sections you are interested in.
Restrict the Range
Running the passage guide or exegetical guide, particularly if you have a large library, can take longer if you use a larger range. For example, if you run the Guide against an entire biblical book as opposed to a specific passage or pericope. So, to increase performance, it is recommended to specify the exact range you are interested in. This also helps in analysing the information returned in the Guide as it is focusing on the passage you are studying.
Restrict the Books Referenced
Some guide sections may have a hidden "Settings" menu that will appear as you hover over the section header. Adjusting these settings may also improve performance and search efficiency by allowing you to search a more refined collection, instead of the entire library. In the Commentaries section, for example, you can choose to focus on a particular series or collection of commentaries as opposed to all those in your library.
Optimize your Layouts
Another area that may lead to slower performance is layout "clutter". While working on Logos, it is very easy to access hundreds of resources, guides and searches, but opening too many of these items at the same time will use up system memory and may decrease overall performance. By closing panels when finished looking at them, you can free up memory and improve general performance. This also helps focus attention on the information that is most relevant.
Layout Tips:
- If you find a resource or article you'd like to save for later, considering clipping it instead of leaving the book open. This is a great way to collect information without cluttering your workspace.
- If you're ready to begin a new study, but are not quite done with the current study, save it in the layouts menu.
This will allow you to close your current panels (command: "Close All") and start your new study from a fresh layout.
Text Comparison
The Text Comparison panel is designed to follow along as you scroll through your Bibles, comparing each verse as you go. Performance can become sluggish if you have too many Bibles open in the tool. If you experience this, remove lower priority versions until performance improves.
Information Tool
The Information Tool displays information about words in the text you are reading. You can set it to update either if you hover your cursor over a word or if you click a word. Hovering is a great way to quickly access more information about a specific word or topic, but it may have an impact on performance (it can also be distracting!). If you set it to update when a word is clicked, this might improve overall performance.
To do this, open the Settings pane in the Tool and select the Update on Click option.
Reviewing Emphasis Options
The Emphasize menu under the Formatting tab provides a number of options for highlighting items of potential interest and could increase the overall load on your system.
If, for example, you have the Corresponding words section enabled, and set to use the Hover option, anytime you hover your cursor over a word will result in matching words being temporarily highlighted. Just as with the Information Tool, it is worth setting this to the Click option and seeing if that improves performance.
If you have the Corresponding text in other books option selected, then selecting a portion of text in one Bible may result in the corresponding portion being temporarily highlighted in another.
Note: This does require the Bibles to either have a reverse interlinear or be tagged original language texts. /p
While having the Current dictionary / lexicon entry (lemma) option enabled will result in words being highlighted in your text that correspond with open entries in lexicons.
These are just some of the options available under the Emphasize menu. If you have some of these enabled, and are experiencing performance problems, it is worth seeing if disabling them improves things.
Visual Filters
Visual Filters are really helpful in highlighting specific words or concepts of interest in your books - particularly Bibles. But they can have an impact on performance.
To minimize performance impact, you can restrict the range you are searching (1) or the books you are searching in (2).
And if you don't need some Visual Filters for your current study purposes, you can them off until you need them again.
Notes and Highlights
As you make notes and highlights in a book this increases the amount of visual data that Logos must render on the screen. This can have an impact on performance. Disabling highlights and notes from previous studies may improve performance on older computers and computers with integrated video cards (like most laptops and budget PCs). Disabling specific sets of notes and highlights in this way does require those notes and highlights to be in designated notebooks that can be enabled and disabled in the Show notes and highlights menu of the Notes tab.
Hardware Acceleration
This option only relates to Windows computers where, in general, you will experience better performance if Enable Hardware Acceleration is set to Yes in Program Settings.
Upgrading Hardware
Adjusting how you use Logos can only go so far toward improving performance. At some point, it may be necessary to consider new hardware. Learn more about Hardware on our Recommended Hardware page.