On my Macbook url-retrieve-synchronously in Emacs 24 is dead slow when running
in the graphical user interface while running it in a terminal
(-nw) it is quite fast. That's weird.
Please try to evaluate the code below in an Emacs started with and
without -nw (and both times started with -Q to rule out local
configuration).
Please let me know if you also notice a remarkable speed difference. And please also let me know if you know why and what to do