Q-Chem combines the Head-Gordon–Pople (HGP) method [813] and the COLD prism method [212] for Hartree-Fock gradient and Hessian evaluations. All two-electron four-center integrals are classified according to their angular momentum types and degrees of contraction. For each type of integrals, the program chooses one with a lower cost. In practice, the HGP method is chosen for most integral classes in a gradient or Hessian calculation, and thus it dominates the total CPU time.
Recently the HGP codes within Q-Chem were completely rewritten for the evaluation of the P II
 P term in the gradient evaluation, and the P II
 P term in the Hessian evaluation. Our emphasis is to improve code efficiency by reducing cache misses rather than by reducing FLOP counts. Some timing results from a Hartree-Fock calculation on azt are shown below. 
Basis Set  | 
    
    AIX  | 
    
    Linux  | 
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 Gradient Evaluation: P II  | 
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Old  | 
    
    New  | 
    
    New/Old  | 
    
    Old  | 
    
    New  | 
    
    New/Old  | 
|
3-21G  | 
    
    34 s  | 
    
    20 s  | 
    
    0.58  | 
    
    25 s  | 
    
    14 s  | 
    
    0.56  | 
6-31G**  | 
    
    259 s  | 
    
    147 s  | 
    
    0.57  | 
    
    212 s  | 
    
    120 s  | 
    
    0.57  | 
DZ  | 
    
    128 s  | 
    
    118 s  | 
    
    0.92  | 
    
    72 s  | 
    
    62 s  | 
    
    0.86  | 
cc-pVDZ  | 
    
    398 s  | 
    
    274 s  | 
    
    0.69  | 
    
    308 s  | 
    
    185 s  | 
    
    0.60  | 
 Hessian Evaluation: P II  | 
||||||
Old  | 
    
    New  | 
    
    New/Old  | 
    
    Old  | 
    
    New  | 
    
    New/Old  | 
|
3-21G  | 
    
    294 s  | 
    
    136 s  | 
    
    0.46  | 
    
    238 s  | 
    
    100 s  | 
    
    0.42  | 
6-31G**  | 
    
    2520 s  | 
    
    976 s  | 
    
    0.39  | 
    
    2065 s  | 
    
    828 s  | 
    
    0.40  | 
DZ  | 
    
    631 s  | 
    
    332 s  | 
    
    0.53  | 
    
    600 s  | 
    
    230 s  | 
    
    0.38  | 
cc-pVDZ  | 
    
    3202 s  | 
    
    1192 s  | 
    
    0.37  | 
    
    2715 s  | 
    
    866 s  | 
    
    0.32  |