Okay, so I did some more performance testing on the 98 machine. I'm attaching a diff that shows the general form of the tests I did, and the results (sorry they're a bit of a mess).
Actually attaching.
[scratch.diff](/uploads/cdff8dc281582be387f3af2e2fa7d113/scratch.diff)
[scratch](/uploads/3da06285dd4253e9d9966d94e6b41036/scratch)