Hi,

I'm using SuSE 9.0 on a 3.2 GHz clone with 64 Meg main memory, with a swap
partition of anout 900 Meg (the default value suggested by YaST).

Running KDE, typically, I'll have KMail, StarOffice and a few terminal
shells open.

The problem is that occasionally, typically when I get e-mails, the whole
system will grind almost to a halt: for example display refreshes when
switching applications can take upto two minutes, opening Konqueror can
take the same amount of time.

The disk doesn't sound like it's doing a great deal, and Ram and Swap are
for example 38% and 86% free, so what's going on?

Any help would be appreciated, this is really embarrassing, I've been a
staunch linux advocate for years, and I hate having to explain why it's
performing so poorly, given that good performance is supposed to be one of
its best features!

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= David --- If you use Microsoft products, you will, inevitably, get
= Mitchell --- viruses, so please don't add me to your address book.
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On Fri, 25 Nov 2005 12:29:17 +0000 David Mitchell <david@edenroad.demon.co.uk> wrote:

> Any help would be appreciated, this is really embarrassing, I've been a
> staunch linux advocate for years, and I hate having to explain why it's
> performing so poorly, given that good performance is supposed to be one of
> its best features!

Then add more RAM - the machine will NATURALLY act that way
with only 64 Meg and running KDE with those apps.

Add more RAM or use a lightweight window manager and lighter
weight applications in place of the heavyweights you're using.

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On Fri, 25 Nov 2005 14:00:21 +0100, mst wrote:

> On Fri, 25 Nov 2005 12:29:17 +0000 David Mitchell <david@edenroad.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
> Then add more RAM - the machine will NATURALLY act that way
> with only 64 Meg and running KDE with those apps.

But I've got almost 32 Meg free, how can I be running short?

> Add more RAM or use a lightweight window manager and lighter
> weight applications in place of the heavyweights you're using.

It's pretty similar under windowmaker too.

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= David --- If you use Microsoft products, you will, inevitably, get
= Mitchell --- viruses, so please don't add me to your address book.
================================================== =====================

On Fri, 25 Nov 2005 14:02:17 +0000 David Mitchell <david@edenroad.demon.co.uk> wrote:

> > Then add more RAM - the machine will NATURALLY act that way
> > with only 64 Meg and running KDE with those apps.
>
> But I've got almost 32 Meg free, how can I be running short?

Let's see the output of:

user@linux:~> free

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On 25 Nov 2005 15:49:20 +0100 mst <mstg@linuxMYSHOESmail.org> wrote:

> On Fri, 25 Nov 2005 14:02:17 +0000 David Mitchell <david@edenroad.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
> > > Then add more RAM - the machine will NATURALLY act that way
> > > with only 64 Meg and running KDE with those apps.
> >
> > But I've got almost 32 Meg free, how can I be running short?
>
> Let's see the output of:
>
> user@linux:~> free

Sorry, finger slipped - be sure the apps are running, as you
would normally be working.

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"mst" <mstg@linuxMYSHOESmail.org> wrote in message
news:43870ae5$1_1@x-privat.org...
> On Fri, 25 Nov 2005 12:29:17 +0000 David Mitchell
> <david@edenroad.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
>> Any help would be appreciated, this is really embarrassing, I've been a
>> staunch linux advocate for years, and I hate having to explain why it's
>> performing so poorly, given that good performance is supposed to be one
>> of
>> its best features!
>
> Then add more RAM - the machine will NATURALLY act that way
> with only 64 Meg and running KDE with those apps.
>
> Add more RAM or use a lightweight window manager and lighter
> weight applications in place of the heavyweights you're using.

Or use a mugh lighter weight window manager such as two and associated
tools. KDE has way, way, way too many tools to do the same thing, and they
tend to be CPU and RAM pigs. If you're trying to run on such a low-memory
system, I'd avoid both KDE and Gnome where possible.

On Fri, 25 Nov 2005 15:49:20 +0100, mst wrote:

> On Fri, 25 Nov 2005 14:02:17 +0000 David Mitchell <david@edenroad.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
>> > Then add more RAM - the machine will NATURALLY act that way
>> > with only 64 Meg and running KDE with those apps.
>>
>> But I've got almost 32 Meg free, how can I be running short?
>
> Let's see the output of:
>
> user@linux:~> free
david@edenroad:~> free
total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 93740 91724 2016 0 5644 28512
-/+ buffers/cache: 57568 36172
Swap: 955828 73292 882536
david@edenroad:~>

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================================================== =====================
= David --- If you use Microsoft products, you will, inevitably, get
= Mitchell --- viruses, so please don't add me to your address book.
================================================== =====================

David Mitchell <david@edenroad.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> On Fri, 25 Nov 2005 15:49:20 +0100, mst wrote:
>> On Fri, 25 Nov 2005 14:02:17 +0000 David Mitchell <david@edenroad.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>>> But I've got almost 32 Meg free, how can I be running short?
>> user@linux:~> free
> david@edenroad:~> free
> total used free shared buffers cached
> Mem: 93740 91724 2016 0 5644 28512
> -/+ buffers/cache: 57568 36172
> Swap: 955828 73292 882536

You are 70M into swap, but yes, you do have 36MB more or less
immediately available (28MB, cache). I would say you are not at that
moment under any sort of memory stress, but I don't see how you can have
got to that condition with a distro that probably uses 128MB ram for X
related things. What are you running? What does "pstree" show? You
should not have so much free.

If your disk were slow, then the swap would slow it all down under many
circumstances. Does turning off swap help? Is your disk doing dma?

Or perhaps you have messed up networking - which would slow X down. Not
having a resolvable hostname would do it.

Peter

On Fri, 25 Nov 2005 16:03:49 +0000 David Mitchell <david@edenroad.demon.co.uk> wrote:

> >> But I've got almost 32 Meg free, how can I be running short?
> >
> > Let's see the output of:
> >
> > user@linux:~> free
> david@edenroad:~> free
> total used free shared buffers cached
> Mem: 93740 91724 2016 0 5644 28512
> -/+ buffers/cache: 57568 36172
> Swap: 955828 73292 882536

I don't see 32MB free. I see 2k free. Cache is important and Linux
uses it efficiently. It appears you probably havent run any of the
apps that you mentioned previously, considering you're using KDE.

More RAM will be the best avenue in improving performance.

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On Fri, 25 Nov 2005 17:36:26 +0100, mst wrote:

> On Fri, 25 Nov 2005 16:03:49 +0000 David Mitchell <david@edenroad.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
>> >> But I've got almost 32 Meg free, how can I be running short?
>> >
>> > Let's see the output of:
>> >
>> > user@linux:~> free
>> david@edenroad:~> free
>> total used free shared buffers cached
>> Mem: 93740 91724 2016 0 5644 28512
>> -/+ buffers/cache: 57568 36172
>> Swap: 955828 73292 882536
>
> I don't see 32MB free. I see 2k free.

I see 36172 K free, perhaps I'm reading it wrongly.

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================================================== =====================
= David --- If you use Microsoft products, you will, inevitably, get
= Mitchell --- viruses, so please don't add me to your address book.
================================================== =====================