However, it's surprising to see people want more rendering speed on their text editors, especially to the point that it would excite them. It's something I've never considered them lacking for their purpose. However, that's probably because I've (nearly) never had the need to handle text files with such characteristics (I usually use it for code and configuration files; none get even close to 1MB), and so to me the text editor is among the fastest, lightest programs I typically run.
rch mentioned scientific data. I guess it's a valid point that there are people working with huge datasets in a practical text file format, and if there are people that can work with huge images or videos on their editors, then why can't text editors do the same.
EDIT: By the way, what are you doing that requires handling text files with thousands of columns and gigabytes of text? That sounds very unusual.