From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Wed Jan 5 23:57:02 2011 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 077E3106566B for ; Wed, 5 Jan 2011 23:57:02 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from roberthuff@rcn.com) Received: from smtp02.lnh.mail.rcn.net (smtp02.lnh.mail.rcn.net [207.172.157.102]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id C17298FC12 for ; Wed, 5 Jan 2011 23:57:01 +0000 (UTC) Received: from mr17.lnh.mail.rcn.net ([207.172.157.37]) by smtp02.lnh.mail.rcn.net with ESMTP; 05 Jan 2011 18:57:00 -0500 Received: from smtp01.lnh.mail.rcn.net (smtp01.lnh.mail.rcn.net [207.172.4.11]) by mr17.lnh.mail.rcn.net (MOS 4.1.9-GA) with ESMTP id AQZ38083; Wed, 5 Jan 2011 18:56:30 -0500 Received: from 209-6-91-204.c3-0.smr-ubr1.sbo-smr.ma.cable.rcn.com (HELO jerusalem.litteratus.org.litteratus.org) ([209.6.91.204]) by smtp01.lnh.mail.rcn.net with ESMTP; 05 Jan 2011 18:56:30 -0500 From: Robert Huff MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Message-ID: <19749.1325.558987.325454@jerusalem.litteratus.org> Date: Wed, 5 Jan 2011 18:56:29 -0500 To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org In-Reply-To: References: <009b01cbad28$883d31c0$98b79540$@com> X-Mailer: VM 7.17 under 21.5 (beta28) "fuki" XEmacs Lucid X-Junkmail-Whitelist: YES (by domain whitelist at mr17.lnh.mail.rcn.net) Subject: Re: Swap Space X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Wed, 05 Jan 2011 23:57:02 -0000 Adam Vande More writes: > > I will be installing 8.1 on a Dell Poweredge 2850, with dual 3 GHz XEON > > processors and 6GB RAM. > > > > What is the recommended swap space? > > > I'm finding conflicting data on this. Some say 0, some say 1 times RAM, > > others say stay with 2 x RAM. > > > > Definitely not 0, but 2x would probably be way too much IMO. 4 - > 6 GB should be enough for most use cases. One data point: last pid: 58457; load averages: 1.91, 2.20, 2.27 up 8+19:16:27 18:51:23 166 processes: 5 running, 158 sleeping, 2 stopped, 1 zombie Mem: 1541M Active, 1267M Inact, 1223M Wired, 195M Cache, 802M Buf, 3440M Free Swap: 18G Total, 11M Used, 18G Free (That's 8g total memory.) It's a fairly lightly loaded workstation. A philosophical consideration: modern disks are cheap, and fairly fast. Repartitioning if you don't have enough is a pain. Robert Huff