How much RAM does your system use?

[samjh]

Just wondering what everyone's memory usage is.

Here are mine on Arch x86_64 with 4GB RAM under Gnome 2.28 and KDE 4.3.

Gnome, Compiz (minimum plugins enabled), Firefox (two tabs: Arch forum and YouTube), Gnome-Terminal, and Gnome System Monitor.
296MB

Most memory is used by Firefox (76.6MB), Compiz (25.7MB), and Nautilus (13.3MB).


total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 3959 668 3291 0 70 301
-/+ buffers/cache: 296 3663
Swap: 4102 0 4102

KDE with KWin compositing (default settings), Firefox (two tabs: Arch forum and YouTube), Konsole, and KDE System Monitor.
336 MB

Most memory is used by Firefox (76.6MB), X (26.8MB), and Plasma Desktop (22.2MB).


total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 3959 1026 2933 0 68 621
-/+ buffers/cache: 336 3623
Swap: 4102 0 4102

[mamamia88]

right now on my netbook running xubuntu 225mb of ram running firefox with 2 tabs and a instance of synaptic

[~sHyLoCk~]

Compiz standalone:

~ > free -m
total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 2007 618 1389 0 7 272
-/+ buffers/cache: 338 1669
Swap: 1906 0 1906

[jwbrase]

My system tends to start out around 290-something. Skype ends up taking about 50 MB more, then Opera with it's memory leak tends to start out small and grow. Sometimes it'll push the total usage over a gig, but that's rare. Compiz vs. Metacity seems to be a difference of about 30 megs.

Right now I'm running around 650.

[x33a]

my arch machine right after boot up uses about 120 MB of ram with gnome.

right now with firefox (2 tabs)(76 MB), gnome-terminal (screen -> 2 shells) (35 MB):

free -m
total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 1009 765 243 0 105 440
-/+ buffers/cache: 220 788
Swap: 2055 0 2055

[happyhamster]

My jaunty desktop after a day of light use:



free -m
total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 7990 7928 61 0 76 6789
-/+ buffers/cache: 1062 6927
Swap: 1921 1 1920


Firefox takes 430MiB right now (10 instances of Firefox running, ~30 tabs I guess. Funny thing is that the swap is actually being used :)

[Warpnow]

810 mbs, but I'm running about 40 apps, of which 2 are web browsers, some text editors with over 100 files open, 2 games (super tux and world of goo), an irc client, totem, with a video playing on my external monitor, pidgin, and I have about a dozen pdf files open preparing for my first day of classes tomorrow.

[schauerlich]

I never got why people with loads of RAM pride themselves on how little RAM they're using. If you've got 4GB, why not use it?

[kk0sse54]

Htop says 1052 MB Ram in use and muse -m reports
Active: 292.863 MB
Inactive: 140.008 MB
Wired: 1057.949 MB
Reserved: 4.109 MB
Cache: 2.207 MB
Kernel: 0.133 MB
Interrupt: 0.008 MB
Buffer: 61.500 MB

Total: 3007.648 MB
Free: 1513.430 MB


and that's just with two terminals, one running screen with portmaster and four tabs in firefox :o

[Warpnow]

I never got why people with loads of RAM pride themselves on how little RAM they're using. If you've got 4GB, why not use it?

If I had 4gbs I'd load the entire OS into ram every boot.

[standingwave]

I never got why people with loads of RAM pride themselves on how little RAM they're using. If you've got 4GB, why not use it?Exactly! I wish it would use more memory. Only rarely does it ever exceed 1GB.

http://i49.tinypic.com/2uzfs46.png

[Psumi]

Bleh...

http://i49.tinypic.com/i20ydg.png

[witeshark17]

When I have a lot of websites open, about 400 - 900 mb

[xuCGC002]

total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 3964 1022 2942 0 85 390
-/+ buffers/cache: 545 3419
Swap: 2910 0 2910

KDE 4.3, Firefox with 3 tabs open.

[Warren Watts]

warren@server-550:~$ uptime
02:09:24 up 9 days, 5:19, 1 user, load average: 0.29, 0.10, 0.02
warren@server-550:~$ sudo lshw -C memory,processor -short
H/W path Device Class Description
================================================== ==========
/0/0 memory 128KB BIOS
/0/4 processor Pentium III (Katmai)
/0/4/a memory 32KB L1 cache
/0/4/b memory 512KB L2 cache
/0/1f memory 512MB System Memory
/0/1f/0 memory 128MB DIMM EDRAM
/0/1f/1 memory 128MB DIMM EDRAM
/0/1f/2 memory 256MB DIMM EDRAM
/0/1f/3 memory DIMM EDRAM [empty]
warren@server-550:~$ free -m
total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 503 477 26 0 133 246
-/+ buffers/cache: 98 405
Swap: 470 33 437


550 MHz PIII 512MB RAM - Set up as server with no GUI

[phillychease]

total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 1444 1344 100 0 170 532
-/+ buffers/cache: 641 803
Swap: 4228 6 4221


hmmmm

[insane_alien]

when its idle, about 200MB.

when it's doing what i built it to do, 8GB + 4GB of swap.

[NoaHall]

On GNU/Linux, when having a web browser + media player + file browser + aMSN open, around 500MB. On Windows Vista/7, it's about 700MB for me. When doing more powerful things, such as playing games, video editing, photo editing, it has free run of 16GBs. I usually run several games at once.

[xpod]

I have 2G in my desktop but the reality is i could have taken a Gig out and still got by just fine....Virtualbox asides.
This old laptop only has 512Mb at the moment and it does me just fine too.In fact, i spend more time on this than i do on the Desktop....which is only a click or two away regardless.

[tom66]

My Pentium III running on Ubuntu 8.10 uses 180MB of memory idle, and 200MB word processing. It has no swap, and has 256MB memory available.

I have noticed that Ubuntu 9.10 is much more of a hog, on my laptop, using almost 1 GB with Chrome + Gedit + Apache running, compared to the 700 MB in 8.10. I'm not too upset, because I've got 3 GB to play with plus 2 GB swap, but it is interesting.

[Nevon]

Ubuntu 9.10 with Firefox, Caffeine, Dropbox and Deluge running.


nevon@loltop:~$ free -m
total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 1975 1825 149 0 30 1374
-/+ buffers/cache: 419 1555
Swap: 5820 0 5820

[Exodist]

My system uses all my RAM, either part is software running normally around 1-1.5GB and the rest is various OS/Software still pre-cached for faster access.

[t0p]

EeePC 701 Jaunty, using Firefox (7 tabs), 1 terminal, totem playing muzak, downloading some warez over http:



t0p@deimos:~$ free -m
total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 2006 1929 76 0 14 1492
-/+ buffers/cache: 423 1583
Swap: 0 0 0


EDIT: Actually I don't get what that means. According to System Monitor, I'm using about 420MB of my 2GB RAM. Where does my misunderstanding lie?

[realzippy]

Exactly! I wish it would use more memory. Only rarely does it ever exceed 1GB.

http://i49.tinypic.com/2uzfs46.png


...run a remastersys backup.
More than 7 Gb in use.....

[barnex]

~> uname -a
Linux karmic 2.6.31-17-generic #54-Ubuntu SMP Thu Dec 10 16:20:31 UTC 2009 i686 GNU/Linux
~> kded -version
Qt: 3.3.8b
KDE: 3.5.10
KDE Daemon: $Id: kded.cpp 711061 2007-09-11 09:42:51Z tpatzig $
~> top
top - 13:50:11 up 5:03, 2 users, load average: 0.09, 0.07, 0.02
Tasks: 156 total, 2 running, 154 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie
Cpu(s): 45.3%us, 4.0%sy, 0.0%ni, 50.7%id, 0.0%wa, 0.0%hi, 0.0%si, 0.0%st
Mem: 2030268k total, 1965292k used, 64976k free, 202156k buffers
Swap: 4192956k total, 0k used, 4192956k free, 925820k cached

PID USER PR NI VIRT RES SHR S %CPU %MEM TIME+ COMMAND
2925 arne 20 0 390m 109m 49m S 1 5.5 6:30.21 amarok
2373 arne 20 0 282m 100m 61m S 0 5.1 1:04.89 soffice.bin
2108 arne 20 0 237m 67m 23m S 0 3.4 0:46.46 thunderbird-bin
7753 arne 20 0 152m 62m 14m R 66 3.1 0:19.74 exe
1966 arne 20 0 319m 57m 27m S 0 2.9 0:31.91 plasma-desktop
1060 root 20 0 104m 39m 14m S 23 2.0 9:00.04 Xorg
3097 arne 20 0 171m 38m 20m S 1 1.9 0:56.41 chrome
7743 arne 20 0 116m 36m 18m S 4 1.8 0:02.87 chrome
7538 arne 20 0 136m 34m 12m S 0 1.7 0:06.64 chrome
1996 arne 20 0 97.7m 33m 21m S 0 1.7 0:01.18 python
1994 arne 20 0 101m 30m 19m S 0 1.6 0:01.17 python
1965 arne 20 0 159m 27m 14m S 0 1.4 0:02.97 knotify4

[samjh]

EeePC 701 Jaunty, using Firefox (7 tabs), 1 terminal, totem playing muzak, downloading some warez over http:



t0p@deimos:~$ free -m
total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 2006 1929 76 0 14 1492
-/+ buffers/cache: 423 1583
Swap: 0 0 0


EDIT: Actually I don't get what that means. According to System Monitor, I'm using about 420MB of my 2GB RAM. Where does my misunderstanding lie?

Using "free -m", the relevant figure is the one just to the right of "-/+ buffers/cache", which is 423 in your case. So that means 423MB of RAM is being used.

Your effective RAM usage is calculated using this formula: used - buffers - cached.
In your case: 1929 - 14 - 1492.

[Chris Edgell]

If I had 4gbs I'd load the entire OS into ram every boot.

Can you explain to me why you'd want to do that?



My Pentium III running on Ubuntu 8.10 uses 180MB of memory idle, and 200MB word processing. It has no swap, and has 256MB memory available.


I guess I don't understand swap, I thought you HAD to have it, or is that only when space is tight?

Thanks

[Warpnow]

Swap isn't necessary however not having any is unwise. Your swap doesn't get used until all of your RAM is used. So if you don't use all your ram, ever, you don't need swap.

I don't think ubuntu has the toram option, but try booting the knoppix livecd with "toram" in the boot parameters. It loads everything into ram, meaning that the hard drive isn't even used...it is outrageously fast.

[vikrant82]

Why is it that more RAM system uses, more sluggish system becomes ? For e.g. My system has 1.5G of RAM. As the usage approaches 1G, I can see noticeable sluggishness. Even when swap is almost untouched as yet.

Also why is it that after a heavy disk IO system seems to be even more sluggish as if it is recovering from a shock ? :) This is more pronounced in windows, but I have also noticed it on Linux.

More so, why should system crawl while I am copying/writing a CD, even when there's plenty of RAM available and CPU is free ?

[Grifulkin]

Older laptop with 1GB of RAM. Running Arch+Openbox

total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 945 342 602 0 0 207
-/+ buffers/cache: 134 810
Swap: 1004 0 1004


And on my netbook running Arch+Openbox.

It starts at about 65mb and usually doesn't exceed 100 until I start a webbrowser with a couple tabs.


And for the life of me I have the same basic set up on ea ch and have found that my X server on the older laptop uses 2.5% of RAM while the X server on my netbook uses ~0.9% and I don't know why there is such a big change in the two.

[SecretCode]

More so, why should system crawl while I am copying/writing a CD, even when there's plenty of RAM available and CPU is free ?

This is probably due to hardware interrupts, fighting with the keyboard and video let alone the hard disks. I find this is particularly bad on laptops.

[NoaHall]

Older laptop with 1GB of RAM. Running Arch+Openbox

total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 945 342 602 0 0 207
-/+ buffers/cache: 134 810
Swap: 1004 0 1004


And on my netbook running Arch+Openbox.

It starts at about 65mb and usually doesn't exceed 100 until I start a webbrowser with a couple tabs.


And for the life of me I have the same basic set up on ea ch and have found that my X server on the older laptop uses 2.5% of RAM while the X server on my netbook uses ~0.9% and I don't know why there is such a big change in the two.

Better graphics cards and better graphics drivers and support for the netbook, would be my guess, not to mention other drivers.

[Chris Edgell]

Please go on with your topic, I just had to get in here and say that the negative is so miniscule and the positive so immense that I got amazed that there ever was the discussion of the miniscule.

So many gracious, thoughtful, helpful and truly caring people...never ceases to amaze me.
People stop what they're doing and answer the many little questions that pop up during the topic that's still ongoing. I just love it!

So here's to you all
Cheers
(Well, I do have a coffee in my hand...(for people who ask if you really laugh when you write) lol.) LOL

Christine

[realzippy]

Swap isn't necessary however not having any is unwise. Your swap doesn't get used until all of your RAM is used. So if you don't use all your ram, ever, you don't need swap.




....only if swappiness is set to 0.

cat /proc/sys/vm/swappiness


https://help.ubuntu.com/community/SwapFaq

[Khakilang]

Old laptop with 512MB RAM. Use mostly Firefox and Open Office.

[pwnst*r]

I never got why people with loads of RAM pride themselves on how little RAM they're using. If you've got 4GB, why not use it?

^this.

I have 8 and the couple of times I've bothered to look at RAM usage I laughed.

[pookiebear]

crunchbang (openbox)
idle at 127mb
with firefox, RDesktop and pidgin going it is at 289mb

[alex_o]

total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 3959 3810 148 0 249 2760
-/+ buffers/cache: 800 3159
Swap: 4996 0 4996

2760mb's of cache hehehehe :p that shure beats running 512mb's

Firefox:200MiB
Totem:42.7MiB
python(screenlets):27.8MiB
compiz.real:19.6MiB
pidgin:19.1MiB
nautilus:9.4MiB

[SuperSonic4]

Arch x86_64: Amarok, Firefox (3 tabs), KWin, Konsole, KMess


total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 7994 1757 6236 0 117 975
-/+ buffers/cache: 664 7330
Swap: 12997 0 12997


unsurprisingly no swap is being used

[Zoot7]

As I type right now, I'm at 223MB as per conky. That's with Nautilus, Banshee and Firefox open in Debian with gnome atop openbox.

I have 8 and the couple of times I've bothered to look at RAM usage I laughed.
Agreed. I've 4 in my main rig and whilst I've seen 64bit Windows 7 go up to maybe 2-2.5GB of usage the few times I've looked, I really don't care how much RAM it uses as long as the OS itself doesn't "chug" or "stutter" in any way while I'm using it.

[Bartender]

Bog-standard Ubuntu 9.04 install. Compiz, firefox, and whatever :)



total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 2011 554 1457 0 30 228
-/+ buffers/cache: 295 1716
Swap: 1937 0 1937

[scouser73]

free -m
total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 1002 920 81 0 216 296
-/+ buffers/cache: 407 595
Swap: 2933 1 2931

[SuperSonic4]

I never got why people with loads of RAM pride themselves on how little RAM they're using. If you've got 4GB, why not use it?

^ this

Unused RAM is wasted RAM. I have 8GB and it means my system doesn't slow, I can enable even more of KDE eyecandy, rip 4 CDs at once, create a DVD and even edit video

[gnomeuser]

1.7 gigs of ram used out of 3 gigs available.

I rather think that is wasteful, I would love for any excess RAM to be used for precaching the most used files or something. RAM is much faster than disk, saving the IO would probably greatly enhance the system performance. Of course that is just a thought, it could be insane.

Regardless the machine is running Compiz, Banshee (doing some heavy lifting bpm detection, downloading podcasts and processing for Mirage), VLC playing a movie (curse you Fluendo DVD for not working properly anymore now I am stuck with this poorly designed UI). A couple of Nautilus windows, Empathy, aMSN, a gnome-terminal and finally gnome-system-monitor which got me the data in the first place. Oh and plenty of Chromium tabs.

I rather think the system is holding up nicely given it's low specs (dual core Atom 330)

[llawwehttam]

llawwehttam@Joe-Pineapples:~$ free -m
total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 3960 1117 2843 0 71 519
-/+ buffers/cache: 525 3434
Swap: 4769 0 4769
4 GB DDR3 Ram with 2.0 Ghz dual core 64 bit processor.

Running conky, firefox 2 tabs, gnome-terminal, rhythmbox, thunderbird.

EDIT: this is a laptop with an nvidia geforce gt130m so it uses some of the ram.

[proxess]

proxess@PRXSS-Laptop:~$ free -m
total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 2009 1509 499 0 93 633
-/+ buffers/cache: 782 1227
Swap: 0 0 0

[Paqman]

I would love for any excess RAM to be used for precaching the most used files or something.

Sounds like you want to install preload ;)

[lotharmat]

Firefox with 3 tabs open and Compiz


total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 3014 1429 1584 0 124 867
-/+ buffers/cache: 437 2577
Swap: 6236 0 6236

[Hallvor]

http://4333762010312117005-a-1802744773732722657-s-sites.googlegroups.com/site/privacyosproject/home/ram.png?attachauth=ANoY7cp0p0h_HbU94XCqF-J2PRaUGpcN4VuC4bE3nRVvE54WI43WQ-ALfgNzS4GqtnpV5Yo2nRYrLou2DwuUutZCwOEKMRkTvNe72RR6 skSXqhnsYTJj5bmUy4BueIIfLaikHvI9E27dNYuyXG368d0R4i HUDqo77jbuQeh2mhcZvfp2VMoWV-4AJxNKO9G-gNLVn1fQmDspGBp1qBUPI8cVD9UzLoinAA%3D%3D&attredirects=0

This is from a virtual machine. I think memory usage is a little higher on a HD install.

My Debian Lenny (64 bit) starts at 120 MB, I think. When I have used it for a few days and have a few browsers, IM and Bittorrent open it usually stabilizes at +-400 MB out of 2 GB.

[etnlIcarus]

Ubuntu 9.04 minimal 32bit, on my Athlon 2800+ w/ 512mb of RAM.

Single tty login: 20-23mb of RAM usage.
X w/ HAL & Xfce 4.6: 110-112mb of RAM usage.
X w/ HAL, Xfce 4.6 & Compiz 0.8.2: 130-140mb of RAM usage.

Currently, with X, HAL, Xfce, Compiz, Pidgin, Galculator, Thunar, Pragha and 3 Firefox windows open (separate windows use more RAM than tabs, unfortunately), I'm sitting at about 275-285mb of RAM usage.

[Paqman]

total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 3962 2313 1648 0 116 1111
-/+ buffers/cache: 1085 2876
Swap: 3223 0 3223

This is with /tmp and browser cache loaded into RAM, and preload enabled, running Chrome, Empathy, Skype, Gwibber and some other nicknacks.

I mostly got 4GB for running VMs. 2GB wasn't quite enough, and i've only got 2 DDR3 slots, so 3GB wasn't an option.

[Grifulkin]

total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 998 169 828 0 0 101
-/+ buffers/cache: 67 930
Swap: 956 0 956


On my netbook running LXDE and Midori and a Terminal.

[Grifulkin]

total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 998 169 828 0 0 101
-/+ buffers/cache: 67 930
Swap: 956 0 956


On my netbook running LXDE and Midori and a Terminal.