memory

Thu Oct 9 14:36:19 MST 2014

Well, maybe.  I don’t' remember if he gave us a 'top' output, which includes the 'load avg'.  If that is much above one you're probably disk limited.  I'd be very interested in the top part of the 'top' output.

And I've been using 'underpowered' CPUs for a long time and not feeling much if any pain - but then I tend to overkill the ram.  4G is minimum, IMHO.

Also 'just browsing the web' CAN eat lots of memory....  Which can drive you into disk thrashing.  Been there, done that WAY too often...

Rusty

-----Original Message-----
From: plug-discuss-bounces at lists.phxlinux.org [mailto:plug-discuss-bounces at lists.phxlinux.org] On Behalf Of techlists at phpcoderusa.com
Sent: Thursday, October 09, 2014 10:14 AM
To: Main PLUG discussion list
Subject: RE: memory

My question is what is the computer used for?  Are you using it for your Linux from scratch project?

If your just browsing the web and doing email, I wonder if more RAM will really make a difference.

When you posted your memory usage I think you had more than 400MB free.

I did a search and it appears you are running the AMD Athlon 64 3500+
(2.2 GHz) processor which by today's standards is not a very powerful CPU.  That might be why things are slower than you might like.

On 2014-10-09 11:41, Carruth, Rusty wrote:
> Michael – Wow, I’m glad Mark thought to check the max memory for the 
> computer!  (Thanks, Mark!)
> 
> So, what Mark said.
> 
> The only thing I’d add is to modify ‘get the fastest memory you can 
> afford’ to something like ‘get as much memory as your computer can 
> hold, as fast as possible’.  There is a tradeoff here – if you have 
> enough memory to keep your computer from swapping/paging/whatever-ing 
> to and from disk then speed of ram matters.  If, however, you don’t 
> have enough memory to keep the majority of ‘active’ programs in memory 
> so you don’t need to go read them from the disk before they can run – 
> well, then faster is better for those things in memory, but as soon as 
> the disk transfer gets slower than the execution speed your faster ram 
> is useless.  Or at least doesn’t help as much as it should. IMHO, of 
> course ;-)
> 
> FROM: plug-discuss-bounces at lists.phxlinux.org
> [mailto:plug-discuss-bounces at lists.phxlinux.org] ON BEHALF OF Mark 
> Phillips
> SENT: Thursday, October 09, 2014 7:36 AM
> TO: Main PLUG discussion list
> SUBJECT: Re: memory
> 
> Michael,
> 
> It seems the max memory is 4GB for that system - 4 banks of 1 GB 
> sticks.
> RAM memory Capacity - 4 GB
> Memory Type - DDR2 SDRAM - DIMM 240-pin Data Integrity Check - Non-ECC 
> Speed - 667 MHz ( PC2-5300 ) Features - Dual rank , unbuffered
> 
> You already have 2 1GB sticks in the machines - what speed are they?
> You should match the speed for all four sticks.
> 
> The second set you mentioned are only 533 MHz, whereas your bus is 667 
> MHz. If your system is slow, get the fastest memory you can afford.
> 
> Mark
> 
> On Wed, Oct 8, 2014 at 1:51 PM, Carruth, Rusty <Rusty at smartm.com>
> wrote:
> 
> Yes, 1024 is one gig, but often some memory is stolen by the 
> motherboard – for example if you have an on-board graphics card that 
> uses main memory for its RAM.
> 
> Personally, if you can afford it and the 4G is less than 2x the 2G I’d 
> get 4G – but if you could find 2x2G sticks then you could have 6G 
> total – not bad IMHO.
> 
> FROM: plug-discuss-bounces at lists.phxlinux.org
> [mailto:plug-discuss-bounces at lists.phxlinux.org] ON BEHALF OF Michael 
> Havens
> SENT: Wednesday, October 08, 2014 1:43 PM
> TO: PLUG
> SUBJECT: memory
> 
> I know this is a stupid question but...
> 
> I got a Dell dimension c521. It is slow so I figure I should add 
> memory. There are 4 memory slots with 2 being used. How much memory is 
> that? Well, the cards that are in there say it they are two cards with
> 1024 mb apiece. 'free -h' reports
> 
> free -h
> 
>  total used free shared buffers cached
> 
> Mem: 1.9G 1.4G 489M 18M 59M 535M
> 
> isn't 1024 one gig? Where is the rest?
> 
> SHould I buy this?
> 
> NEW 4GB 4X1GB DDR2 PC2-5300 667MHZ RAM MEMORY FOR DELL DIMENSION C521 
> [1]
> 
> or should I get this?
> 
> 2GB (2X1GB) RAM MEMORY CMS COMPATIBLE WITH DELL DIMENSION C521 DESKTOP 
> [2]
> 
> :-)~MIKE~(-:
> 
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> 
> 
> Links:
> ------
> [1]
> http://www.amazon.com/4x1GB-PC2-5300-667MHz-Memory-Dimension/dp/B00KFN
> D9SC/ref=sr_1_1?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1412798813&sr=1-
> 1&keywords=dimension+c521+memory
> [2]
> http://www.amazon.com/Compatible-Dell-Dimension-C521-Desktop/dp/B00BL3
> 0RZS/ref=sr_1_3?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1412798813&sr=1-
> 3&keywords=dimension+c521+memory
> [3] http://lists.phxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss
> 
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