Sub Page_Load(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As EventArgs)

        Dim FILENAME As String = Server.MapPath("Output2.txt")

        Dim objStreamWriter As StreamWriter = New StreamWriter(FILENAME, False, Encoding.ASCII, 10000000)

        Dim stringval As String
        Dim whitespace As String
        whitespace = 1
        For x = 4 To 100000
            whitespace = whitespace & x
        Next
        stringval = whitespace

        objStreamWriter.WriteLine(stringval)

        objStreamWriter.Flush()
        objStreamWriter.Close()
    

    End Sub

The code above works, it outputs a file at 480 kb - taking 2 minutes to do so.

What i'd like to ask the community is, could this process be cut down to less than 30 seconds or even better less than 10 seconds. I also like to add the actual output files i have are much larger than 400 KB, they are in the 1 to 2 MB (more than 100000 characters).

At this moment, i would prefer sticking with this method to write out strings to a text file - however i am open to suggestions depending on how easy it is to migrate to the other method.

As you notice, i have no idea why but i read some where specifying a large buffersize increases performance, however i don't notice this at all when i left it on default or not.

Regards,
Joker.

 Well...your IO is pretty good...but there's a reason for the hideous performance. Strings in .net are immutable. Whenever you change a string, a new string is created. Done enough times, these pile up before garbage collection and hinders performance. Also, your stringval variable is pretty much unnecessary. Consider this bit of code instead:

Dim whiteSpace As New StringBuilder()

For x=4 To 100000

    whiteSpace.Append(x)

Next

objStreamWriter.WriteLine(whiteSpace.ToString())

        Dim getconnection As String = WebConfigurationManager.ConnectionStrings("DBConnect").ConnectionString
        Dim conn As New SqlConnection(getconnection)
        conn.Open()

        Dim filename As String = Server.MapPath("output56.txt")
        Dim writer As StreamWriter = New StreamWriter(filename, False, Encoding.ASCII, 500000)
        
        Dim sql As String = "SELECT [testname] FROM testtable"
        Dim getdata As New SqlCommand(sql, conn)
        Dim reader As SqlDataReader = getdata.ExecuteReader()

        Dim name As String
        Dim counter As String = 0

        While reader.Read()
        
            name = reader.GetString(0) & " this working?"
            writer.WriteLine(name)
            counter = counter + 1
            writer.WriteLine(counter)

        End While

        writer.Flush()
        writer.Close()
        reader.Close()
        conn.Close()
       

Thanks for the help, above is the code i'm actually using (plus a lot more), i'm going to write an insert statement to put in 100,000 data to simulate what maybe a real time event.

Then see how it performs.

However, the current code - the sliced bit handles 10000 rows very nice, 1 second and done.

I guess the above for loop was over kill in characters but thank you so much, i kept thinking it was streamwriter but now i know it's to do with the string. If i run into issues, i'll definately rework the way i'm using strings.

You my friend, ROCK :)

regards
Joker

* Edit *

Just did this and beautiful - i actually tested my current code with some modifications and it created a 94 mb Text File

Too bad i can't compress the text file down to 1 mb...but hey if anyone comes and reads this i would be glad to hear of any method to compress it to 1 mb (crosses fingers and prays??? lol ... i'd think not)