how fast is xfce
 

im now using xfce over gnome and i like it.... but it doesn't seem to be very fast. i have come to this conclusion because when i listen to an mp3 with xmms in xfce, the thing skipps, and it doesn't in gnome not even in windows. is xfce just slow or are there any settings i need to modify to optimize it

Not sure what would cause xmms to be slow and skip, but usually xfce is very fast, well at least when I use it. Do any other programs seem affected ?

It depends on your machine. MP3 needs some computing power, so it's hard to listen to 128 kb/s MP3 on 486. :)
It looks it's not your case, it may be something between xface and gtk or esd (sound daemon). Look if you get errors (in /var/log/messages or into your X logs).

no mara i dont see any error messages in /var/log/messages, what and where are the x logs?

/var/log/XFree86* (not in every system)