On Wed, Jul 04, 2012 at 09:00:27PM +0200, Jan Stary wrote:
> On Jul 04 10:57:45, Otto Moerbeek wrote:
> > On Tue, Jul 03, 2012 at 07:06:37PM +0200, Jan Stary wrote:
> >
> > > > this is another problem. configure
> > > > swap to be double the RAM size, or if you insist on loading the
> > > > machine about 4 times the RAM size. you obviously forgot to or didn't
> > > > want to configure swap.
> > >
> > > is the "twice the RAM" mantra still valid today?
> >
> > No, that only makes sense for relatively small systems. The disklabel
> > auto allocation policy uses a max size if 2x physmem for physmem <
> > 256M. Otherwise it allocates a bit more than physical mem size.
>
> Well, this machine has 128M - does that mean that having 256M of swap
> would make my system generally better?
Depends how much memory is actually used by the processes on it. If
you never will hit swap having it or not should not make a difference.
>
> > Running without swap should be no problem, though you might hit code
> > paths otherwise not taken, so there is an buigger chance you'll find
> > bugs. If that is good or not depends on your personal perspective.
>
> On machines that are not as "fixed" as the ALIX
> (128M soldered on board), I try to have enough RAM
> to not ever have to swap. I will probably reinstall
> this ALIX with 256M swap and see if this problem disappears.
>
> Before I do that, are there any hints on these code paths
> not usually taken, such as how I might hit this more often
> on a smallmem machine such as this? Or any specific tests?
Sorry, dunno. It's just that having a machine without swap is an
uncommon configuration. ut yo cold try to stress the machine memory
wise and see what happens.
-Otto
