Memory, swap, and limits

[James Kosin]

Beartooth Sciurivore wrote:
> 	Every new computer I've yet had has begun slowing down soon after 
> I get it -- probably because I keep several browsers open, with from 
> several to many tabs each. I've learned long since to make sure each 
> machine has all the memory it can handle from the git-go, before it ever 
> reaches my house. And every time I do an install, when I get to 
> anaconda's partitioning stage, I try to triple the swap; it always 
> refuses.
>
> 	Yet the little bar graph that Gnome's System Monitor (2.22.2 on 
> the present F9 machine; probably the same on all the rest -- I always 
> upgrade early) puts on my panel seldom shows a total of memory and swap 
> together much less than 95% in use.
>
> 	Otoh, I've never gotten anywhere near filling up a hard drive, 
> except once when I had a testbed machine triple booting three different 
> distros. So why can't I at least increase the swap space? 
>
>   
Having TOO much swap space can be a detriment and not an asset.  
Usually, the rule of thumb I go by is allocate about 2x the amount of 
physical memory installed on the system; for machines with < 1M.  This 
number will need to approach more or less 1x for machines with 1-2M.  
With machines with > 2M; I'm not sure swap space will make much of a 
difference, unless you rely on X heavily.

James

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