Wait!!! I was so used to old always beating new, I completely missed that new is faster now! I don't know why or how but this has made me so happy.
Consistently too! Just needed to use PHP 5.4 I guess.
Messages: 73
Iterations: 1000
Total Time In Tests: 19.85
Total Old Time: 10.6
Total New Time: 9.25
Diff Total Time: 1.35
Diff Total Time %: 9.73
Messages: 73
Iterations: 1000
Total Time In Tests: 20.27
Total Old Time: 10.78
Total New Time: 9.49
Diff Total Time: 1.28
Diff Total Time %: 9.9
Messages: 73
Iterations: 1000
Total Time In Tests: 20.22
Total Old Time: 10.74
Total New Time: 9.48
Diff Total Time: 1.26
Diff Total Time %: 9.86
There are still some changes that I can make and it needs more messages to test, but right now my code looks close to production for at least a mod. EDIT: forgot that it doesn't test for or handle disabled tags properly. Need to do that. before anything.
Now I have to edit the tests so that it shows me the difference between old and new and not just max/min.