I'm afraid I can't really answer to the performance question, but on the off chance this is useful...

I ran into a situation a while back where I couldn't use Storable on a particular platform. I did some reasearch into other freeze/thaw methods, and ended up using Data::Dumper . Freeze by saving the Dumper output, and thaw by eval'ing it again. To my surprise, there are actually a number of useful configuration settings for Data::Dumper with this sort of freeze/thaw in mind. ($Data::Dumper::Freezer for example)

Obviously, data size can be an issue with this solution, so check out $Data::Dumper::Indent. Again, I can't speak to performance, but from the doc: "The Data::Dumper module is a dual implementation, with almost all functionality written in both pure Perl and also in XS ('C'). Since the XS version is much faster, it will always be used if possible."