An application that uses native look and feel needs longer time to start because building of its UI and painting is slower than with metal look and feel.

I measured time to create main window and paint it on a simple app that mimics NetBeans UI - menu hierarchy, toolbar icons, status line and currently empty main desktop area. Results on P4 2GHz, 1GB, WinXP consistently show the difference.

With default L&F and JDK1.4.2_03 times for warm start of this app are 961, 972, 961ms.
With WindowsLookAndFeel and JDK1.4.2_03 times for warm start of this app are 1222, 1242, 1252ms.
With default L&F and JDK1.5.0b39 times for warm start of this app are 1072, 1081, 1082ms.
With WindowsLookAndFeel and JDK1.5.0b39 times for warm start of this app are 1473, 1472, 1482ms.

###@###.### 2004-04-06