I had to check this myself so I did some tests. Time count is based from entering the url in browser until startimage loads, or first thumbnail loads.
When the galleries are
uncached:
soda v2: 9sec
V1: 7sec
When the galleries are
cached:
soda V2: 5sec
v1: 3sec
[These results will of course vary by location, speed of internet, speed of computer, and other factors]
There are a few differences that have to be mentioned though:
# The V2 gallery starts directly in thumbnails mode, meaning that it has to load and process a list of images in a folder before it can proceed.
# It loads more information related to the audioplayer (soundtracks+soundtrack info)
# It loads much bigger configurations (That allow us to make it more flexible with more features) Ex.:
https://www.photo.gallery/soda/?a=config ... Config.xml
# It loads an additional CSS stylesheet(Which allows full control of the text/textformatting) Ex.:
https://www.photo.gallery/soda/imagevue/ ... agevue.css
In addition to the above, the PHP scripts that run V2 are more complex, and for sure it will add slightly to the load time. In V2 there is much more data loaded for all the folders and all the images, may it be titles, descriptions or any other attributes. For example, the menu in V2 displays descriptions and previewimages, which need to be loaded beforehand -
https://www.photo.gallery/soda/?a=folders
Taking all this into consideration, my opinion is that it is worth the wait ...