On Monday 07 May 2007 18:16, Carlos E. R. wrote:
The Monday 2007-05-07 at 07:25 +1000, Registration Account wrote:
...
For example I have 2 GIG of RAM currently and am thinking of changing it to 4 GIG. I understand that the kernel can use more file cacheing, but that is what I do not want to know. With the superior way the Linux Kernel manages Memory, if we remove the increased file caching ability will the Kernel be able to utilise the extra memory registers for processing.
I think you got it wrong... if there is more memory, programs will be able to use more memory, /if/ they request it. All unused memory will simply end up being used as cache.
If currently, with 2G, you see no swap used, increasing the ram will not give more memory to programs.
This is true, as far as it goes. However, the kernel makes good use of physical memory pages not currently needed by applications. It uses them to cache disk contents and reduce the amount of physical disk I/O required to satisfy any given set of file system requests. So even if your application mix never needs more than, say, 1GB, having 2GB or 4GB (or any larger amount, as long as your hardware is such that it's actually accessible, which depends in large part on the CPU you're using--modern systems can all typically access at least 2 or 3GB), having more than that much physical RAM can still improve your system's overall throughput.
-- Cheers, Carlos E. R.
Randall Schulz -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org