diff --git a/ChangeLog b/ChangeLog
index 24265a54..add0c5c7 100644
--- a/ChangeLog
+++ b/ChangeLog
@@ -1,5 +1,9 @@
 2012-07-21  Jay Berkenbilt  <ejb@ql.org>
 
+	* Change configure to have image comparison tests disabled by
+	default.  Update README and README.maintainer with information
+	about running them.
+
 	* Add --pages command-line option to qpdf to enable page-based
 	merging and splitting.
 
diff --git a/README b/README
index ab751b5d..1c27b6fa 100644
--- a/README
+++ b/README
@@ -95,3 +95,27 @@ files in include/qpdf, especially QPDF.hh, QPDFObjectHandle.hh, and
 QPDFWriter.hh.  You can also study the code of qpdf/qpdf.cc, which
 exercises most of the public interface.  There are additional example
 programs in the examples directory.
+
+
+Additional Notes on Test Suite
+==============================
+
+By default, slow tests are disabled.  Slow tests include image
+comparison tests and large file tests.  Image comparison tests can be
+enabled by passing --enable-test-compare-images to ./configure.  Large
+file tests can be enabled by passing --with-large-file-test-path=path
+to ./configure or by setting the LARGE_FILE_TEST_PATH environment
+variable.  Run ./configure --help for additional options.  The test
+suite provides nearly full coverage even without these tests.  Unless
+you are making deep changes to the library or testing this on a new
+platform for the first time, there is no real reason to run these
+tests.  If you're just running the test suite to make sure that qpdf
+works for your build, the default tests are adequate.
+
+If you are packaging qpdf for a distribution and preparing a build
+that is run by an autobuilder, you may want to add the
+--enable-show-failed-test-output to configure options.  This way, if
+the test suite fails, test failure detail will be included in the
+build output.  Otherwise, you will have to have access to the
+qtest.log file from the build to view test failures.  The debian
+packages for qpdf enable this option, for example.
diff --git a/README.maintainer b/README.maintainer
index b27cabeb..9b89d88b 100644
--- a/README.maintainer
+++ b/README.maintainer
@@ -1,10 +1,11 @@
 Release Reminders
 =================
 
- * When making a release, always remember to run large file tests.
-   For a major release, consider running a spelling checker over the
-   source code to catch errors in variable names, strings, and
-   comments.
+ * When making a release, always remember to run large file tests and
+   image comparison tests (--enable-test-compare-images
+   --with-large-file-test-path=/path).  For a major release, consider
+   running a spelling checker over the source code to catch errors in
+   variable names, strings, and comments.
 
  * Consider running tests with latest gcc and/or valgrind.  To do
    this, replace, build with debugging and without shared libraries.
diff --git a/configure.ac b/configure.ac
index 24831ee8..91bddfe2 100644
--- a/configure.ac
+++ b/configure.ac
@@ -213,13 +213,13 @@ fi
 AC_SUBST(SKIP_TEST_COMPARE_IMAGES)
 AC_ARG_ENABLE(test-compare-images,
    AS_HELP_STRING([--enable-test-compare-images],
-		  [whether to compare images in test suite; enabled by default, enabling requires ghostscript and tiffcmp to be available]),
+		  [whether to compare images in test suite; disabled by default, enabling requires ghostscript and tiffcmp to be available]),
    [if test "$enableval" = "no"; then
       SKIP_TEST_COMPARE_IMAGES=1
     else
       SKIP_TEST_COMPARE_IMAGES=0
     fi],
-   [SKIP_TEST_COMPARE_IMAGES=0])
+   [SKIP_TEST_COMPARE_IMAGES=1])
 
 AC_SUBST(SHOW_FAILED_TEST_OUTPUT)
 AC_ARG_ENABLE(show-failed-test-output,