I recommend that you first move to jogl 2. A tool to help you do that is created by Micheal (for import and Class names…etc).

As for the text rendering we are currently working on HW accelerated text renderer which should be available soon (not too soon but soon J ).

Meanwhile, I guess you should look into LOD schemes to hide unneeded text from view point. You should not draw everything to each frame…if items are not shown or far away its best that you hide them. Or decrease qulity…etc

This by it self should give you a boost in performance.

Hope it helps!