Ok. Everytime you create a new sprite, it creates a new surface, because each sprite can have a different texture. Everytime renderworld is called, it's renders the world, stalling slightly between each surface (as far as i understand), which takes time. So, the less surfaces you have in your game, the better. If your using 100 odd sprites in your game, essentially it's 100 surfaces. That's a hell of alot of surfaces, for just one thing.
Now, using single surface, you have one surface, one mesh. It renders far quicker then the sprites, because theres no stalling inbetween, as it's the one surface. That the real speed up. transforming and manually rotating the quads is actually very quick. The math for one thing, is done very quickly. The biggest slowdown you'll normally experience in a game, is the graphics rendering. Shaving a milli-ultra second off by making your math formula shorter, ain't gonna help you out. :o)
Now, using single surface, you have one surface, one mesh. It renders far quicker then the sprites, because theres no stalling inbetween, as it's the one surface. That the real speed up. transforming and manually rotating the quads is actually very quick. The math for one thing, is done very quickly. The biggest slowdown you'll normally experience in a game, is the graphics rendering. Shaving a milli-ultra second off by making your math formula shorter, ain't gonna help you out. :o)