If you are moving to CI because your raw PHP APP is slow, then you will end up with more frustration.

there is no way how any framework would work faster than raw PHP scripts.

do not listen to tech marketing people at all.

Rather Focus on the bottlenecks and analyze what makes your app slow and handle those issues individually.

If you are running off MySQL Databases, a good start would be to check and correct indexing in the tables, and then also use something like memcache to cache your frequent database queries.

Any framework no matter done by whom and however elegant, would be ever faster than PHP. PERIOD.

These frameworks are mostly used to make development cycle faster and also to handle parallel development easier with a large team of developers. otherwise MVC approach itself is a piece of crap of having to do the same thing at 3 places for even the most simple and mundane task(unless otherwise there is a very valid reasoning for something to perform better). The only place where MVC can shine is when dealing with a bunch of developers’ team who have varied skills like Design, HTML , Coding and Databases.

If you can develop an app without MVC , then just go for it, there is nothing wrong or right in terms of coding approach.

MVC just adds more layers of complexity and forces the developers(erring rather) to behave properly.

once again, do not think CI or any framework will make yur app work faster. and anyone who dis-agrees let us discuss.

CakePHP is indeed great. I love the convenience it offers.

Lately I’ve found myself working much more in code igniter, mostly because I have some clients using expression engine, and now that EE 2.0 is built on codeigniter, were able to combine a super-user-friendly CMS with a sweet app framework.

In my opinion you use what helps you get the job done the quickest and it should pass the “bang your keyboard” test. Which is how many times you want to bang your keyboard and/or computer. It’s just about being comfortable and efficient with your code. You want to not let it get out of hand and you want to come back 6 months later and know exactly what’s going on with your code. It’s possible to have that “zen” with any framework or no framework at all too. I just find that frameworks at least give you a paradigm to follow and convention.

For that reason, I personally chose CakePHP because it’s a bit more strict (though completely flexible and you can change conventions, I’ve used it to “take over” existing sites and use existing database schema without many problems, though I can’t say the queries were “efficient” of course).