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Groups > comp.os.linux.misc > #8108

Re: Wish to try Linux

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On 05/10/2013 11:40 PM, Aragorn wrote:
> On Friday 10 May 2013 20:20, lichtblitz conveyed the following to 
> comp.os.linux.misc...
>
>> Robert Heller wrote:
>>
>>>> 64 bit runs fine in 1GB.
>>> Sure -- I even have some 64-bit VMs with only 1gig (they are build
>>> boxes). It is just that with < 4gig of RAM, 64-bit is overkill,
>> Overkill indeed, especially that the 32-bit kernel can address the the
>> whole < 4GB at least on en EFI-Board [...
> EFI has nothing to do with that.  All 32-bit operating systems have a 4 
> GiB address space.  However, when the machine has more than ~3.2 GiB of 
> RAM, then chances are that the RAM above that barrier will be obscured 
> by the PCI address space, depending on how many legacy PCI devices you 
> have in your system.
>
> Rationale: PCI devices are accessed by way of an address space,
>            logically mapped from the top of the 32-bit 4 GiB address
>            space downward.  As memory addresses cannot be assigned to
>            more than one purpose, the RAM behind that address space is
>            then obscured.  On hardware which supports PAE and with a
>            PAE-enabled kernel, the obscured RAM can be remapped to an
>            address space above the 4 GiB barrier, as PAE allows for
>            36-bit memory addressing and thus up to 64 GiB of RAM, in
>            pages of 3 GiB for each userspace process (plus 1 GiB for
>            the kernel address space).
>
>> ...] and btw. utilizes less RAM.
> The surplus cost in RAM consumption of running a 64-bit system versus 
> running a 32-bit system is highly overrated, albeit that I will agree 
> that with only 1 GiB of RAM installed in the machine, any modern 64-bit 
> distribution is going to feel quite asphyxiated, and the machine's going 
> to be doing lots of swapping.  
>
> I wouldn't recommend going with 64-bit on any machine with less than 2 
> GiB RAM.  But then again, even though it's possible, I wouldn't 
> recommend running any modern 32-bit distribution with less than 2 GiB of 
> RAM anymore either, especially not with a heavyweight graphical user 
> interface such as KDE 4, GNOME 3 or even present-day XFCE - which is 
> also built on the GTK+ libraries, like GNOME.
>
> With only limited RAM available, I definitely recommend a lightweight 
> window manager, e.g. FluxBox/BlackBox/OpenBox, WindowMaker, or something 
> similar.
>
>> Nevertheless with exact 4GB RAM on board I always use 64-bit kernel.
> With 4 GiB installed in the machine, if you have any PCIe devices in 
> your system, then that is the sane thing to do, as their address space 
> will be mapped above the 4 GiB barrier, leaving more accessible RAM 
> available below the 4 GiB mark.
>
I have a machine that has two 550 MHz Pentium III processors, 512 Meg of
RAM, 3 hard drives, a few PCI devices (sound board, ethernet board, two
SCSI controllers, ...) and it runs fine with CentOS 5 (32 bit) on it
usually running GNOME. Those processors are a little slow by todays
standards. I keep it only because it works just fine. I mainly run BOINC
processes on it, and it does not swap. On the other hand, sometimes one
of the BOINC processes is swapped out (no thrashing) waiting for memory.
But that kind of swapping happens only about every 90 minutes. I did not
dare try CentOS 6 on it though. As I use it now, it does not really need
a sound board, or one of the SCSI controllers (CD-ROM
reader-burner).When I bought it, it came with Red Hat Linux 5.0 and was
soon upgraded to Red Hat Linux 5.2. The last Red Hat Linux I ran it with
was Red Hat Linux 7.3 that was a very good distribution. It never
thrashed. It was my main computer for at least 4 years.

But I would not BUY a machine like that today, and if I did, I suppose I
would have more memory in it. Also, I doubt I could get processors as
slow as those anymore. But it works just fine as a backup computer. I
used to dual boot it with Windows XP in it that I needed only to do my
income tax. I bought the machine new in early 2000.

My "new" machine has 8 GBytes RAM and runs x86_64 Red Hat Enterprise
Linux 6 on it. It has a slow 4-core Xeon in it. It could have two Xeon
processors and something like 384 GBytes of RAM, but I do not need that
kind of computer anymore. But the motherboard is ready if I ever did.

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Thread

Wish to try Linux Peter Percival <peterxpercival@hotmail.com> - 2013-05-09 20:09 +0100
  Re: Wish to try Linux Jean-David Beyer <jeandavid8@verizon.net> - 2013-05-09 15:25 -0400
    Re: Wish to try Linux Robert Heller <heller@deepsoft.com> - 2013-05-09 15:24 -0500
      Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-05-09 21:51 +0100
      Re: Wish to try Linux Jean-David Beyer <jeandavid8@verizon.net> - 2013-05-09 18:41 -0400
  Re: Wish to try Linux Dan Espen <despen@verizon.net> - 2013-05-09 15:28 -0400
    Re: Wish to try Linux Peter Percival <peterxpercival@hotmail.com> - 2013-05-10 16:48 +0100
  Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-05-09 20:48 +0100
    Re: Wish to try Linux Octothorpe <Octothorpe@invalid.com> - 2013-05-09 16:45 -0400
      Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-05-09 23:50 +0100
        Re: Wish to try Linux Octothorpe <Octothorpe@invalid.com> - 2013-05-10 07:41 -0400
          Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-05-10 13:01 +0100
            Re: Wish to try Linux Octothorpe <Octothorpe@invalid.com> - 2013-05-10 08:49 -0400
              Re: Wish to try Linux Aragorn <stryder@telenet.be.invalid> - 2013-05-10 15:20 +0200
                Re: Wish to try Linux Octothorpe <Octothorpe@invalid.com> - 2013-05-10 16:11 -0400
          Re: Wish to try Linux Jean-David Beyer <jeandavid8@verizon.net> - 2013-05-10 08:04 -0400
            Re: Wish to try Linux Bill Marcum <bill@nowhere.invalid> - 2013-05-16 07:58 -0400
          Re: Wish to try Linux Bill Marcum <bill@nowhere.invalid> - 2013-05-16 07:56 -0400
            Re: Wish to try Linux Octothorpe <Octothorpe@invalid.com> - 2013-05-16 09:32 -0400
              Re: Wish to try Linux Aragorn <thorongil@telenet.be.invalid> - 2013-05-16 16:03 +0200
                Re: Wish to try Linux John Hasler <jhasler@newsguy.com> - 2013-05-16 09:27 -0500
                Re: Wish to try Linux Octothorpe <Octothorpe@invalid.com> - 2013-05-16 10:53 -0400
                Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-05-16 15:30 +0100
                Re: Wish to try Linux Octothorpe <Octothorpe@invalid.com> - 2013-05-16 10:52 -0400
              Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-05-16 15:30 +0100
              Re: Wish to try Linux Jean-David Beyer <jeandavid8@verizon.net> - 2013-05-16 16:14 -0400
                Re: Wish to try Linux Octothorpe <Octothorpe@invalid.com> - 2013-05-16 17:23 -0400
    Re: Wish to try Linux notbob <notbob@nothome.com> - 2013-05-09 23:49 +0000
      Re: Wish to try Linux Robert Heller <heller@deepsoft.com> - 2013-05-09 19:35 -0500
        Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-05-10 05:30 +0100
          Re: Wish to try Linux notbob <notbob@nothome.com> - 2013-05-10 14:27 +0000
      Re: Wish to try Linux Michael Black <et472@ncf.ca> - 2013-05-09 22:13 -0400
    Re: Wish to try Linux Peter Percival <peterxpercival@hotmail.com> - 2013-05-10 16:50 +0100
      Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-05-10 17:19 +0100
        Re: Wish to try Linux Peter Percival <peterxpercival@hotmail.com> - 2013-05-15 16:27 +0100
          Re: Wish to try Linux J G Miller <miller@yoyo.ORG> - 2013-05-15 16:34 +0000
            Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-05-15 17:46 +0100
              Re: Wish to try Linux J G Miller <miller@yoyo.ORG> - 2013-05-15 18:15 +0000
                Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-05-15 19:32 +0100
                Re: Wish to try Linux Dan Espen <despen@verizon.net> - 2013-05-15 14:52 -0400
                Re: Wish to try Linux J G Miller <miller@yoyo.ORG> - 2013-05-15 21:11 +0000
                Re: Wish to try Linux Robert Heller <heller@deepsoft.com> - 2013-05-15 13:54 -0500
                Re: Wish to try Linux Jean-David Beyer <jeandavid8@verizon.net> - 2013-05-16 01:01 -0400
                Re: Wish to try Linux Aragorn <thorongil@telenet.be.invalid> - 2013-05-16 10:52 +0200
                Re: Wish to try Linux Jean-David Beyer <jeandavid8@verizon.net> - 2013-05-16 08:25 -0400
                Re: Wish to try Linux J G Miller <miller@yoyo.ORG> - 2013-05-16 18:56 +0000
                Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-05-16 20:33 +0100
                Re: Wish to try Linux J G Miller <miller@yoyo.ORG> - 2013-05-16 19:35 +0000
                Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-05-16 20:43 +0100
                Re: Wish to try Linux bruce.sinclair@NOSPAMORELSEagresearch.NOTco.NOTnz (Bruce Sinclair) - 2013-05-19 23:33 +0000
                Re: Wish to try Linux Jean-David Beyer <jeandavid8@verizon.net> - 2013-05-16 16:16 -0400
          Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-05-15 17:44 +0100
            Re: Wish to try Linux Robert Heller <heller@deepsoft.com> - 2013-05-15 13:44 -0500
              Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-05-15 20:37 +0100
    Re: Wish to try Linux "Chris F.A. Johnson" <cfajohnson@gmail.com> - 2013-05-14 13:51 -0400
      Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-05-14 21:16 +0100
        Re: Wish to try Linux "Chris F.A. Johnson" <cfajohnson@gmail.com> - 2013-05-14 17:49 -0400
          Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-05-15 00:02 +0100
  Re: Wish to try Linux Robert Heller <heller@deepsoft.com> - 2013-05-09 15:03 -0500
    Re: Wish to try Linux Peter Percival <peterxpercival@hotmail.com> - 2013-05-23 14:09 +0100
      Re: Wish to try Linux Richard Kettlewell <rjk@greenend.org.uk> - 2013-05-23 14:38 +0100
        Re: Wish to try Linux Peter Percival <peterxpercival@hotmail.com> - 2013-05-23 16:33 +0100
          Re: Wish to try Linux John Hasler <jhasler@newsguy.com> - 2013-05-23 10:55 -0500
            Re: Wish to try Linux Peter Percival <peterxpercival@hotmail.com> - 2013-05-23 19:00 +0100
              Re: Wish to try Linux Aragorn <thorongil@telenet.be.invalid> - 2013-06-01 11:43 +0200
                Re: Wish to try Linux notbob <notbob@nothome.com> - 2013-06-01 11:37 +0000
                Re: Wish to try Linux Balwinder S Dheeman <bsd.SANSPAM@anu.homelinux.net> - 2013-06-01 21:59 +0530
                Re: Wish to try Linux Aragorn <thorongil@telenet.be.invalid> - 2013-06-01 19:14 +0200
                Re: Wish to try Linux notbob <notbob@nothome.com> - 2013-06-01 17:43 +0000
                Re: Wish to try Linux Michael Black <et472@ncf.ca> - 2013-06-01 19:33 -0400
                Re: Wish to try Linux Aragorn <thorongil@telenet.be.invalid> - 2013-06-02 02:37 +0200
                Re: Wish to try Linux Jean-David Beyer <jeandavid8@verizon.net> - 2013-06-01 23:05 -0400
                Re: Wish to try Linux Richard Kettlewell <rjk@greenend.org.uk> - 2013-06-02 09:33 +0100
                Re: Wish to try Linux Jean-David Beyer <jeandavid8@verizon.net> - 2013-06-02 07:02 -0400
                Re: Wish to try Linux David Brown <david.brown@removethis.hesbynett.no> - 2013-06-02 13:26 +0200
                Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-06-02 15:47 +0100
                Re: Wish to try Linux Jean-David Beyer <jeandavid8@verizon.net> - 2013-06-02 14:52 -0400
                Re: Wish to try Linux David Brown <david.brown@removethis.hesbynett.no> - 2013-06-02 13:32 +0200
          Re: Wish to try Linux Roger Blake <rogblake@iname.invalid> - 2013-05-23 17:09 +0000
            Re: Wish to try Linux Peter Percival <peterxpercival@hotmail.com> - 2013-05-23 19:06 +0100
            Re: Wish to try Linux Robert Riches <spamtrap42@jacob21819.net> - 2013-05-24 04:48 +0000
  Re: Wish to try Linux Bit Twister <BitTwister@mouse-potato.com> - 2013-05-09 20:03 +0000
  Re: Wish to try Linux unruh <unruh@invalid.ca> - 2013-05-09 20:19 +0000
    Re: Wish to try Linux bad sector <forgetski@postit_INVALID_.gov> - 2013-05-09 20:27 -0400
      Re: Wish to try Linux unruh <unruh@invalid.ca> - 2013-05-10 15:30 +0000
  Re: Wish to try Linux Stef <not@this.address.com> - 2013-05-10 03:05 +0000
    Re: Wish to try Linux notbob <notbob@nothome.com> - 2013-05-10 14:35 +0000
      Re: Wish to try Linux Stef <not@this.address.com> - 2013-05-10 16:44 +0000
        Re: Wish to try Linux notbob <notbob@nothome.com> - 2013-05-10 16:57 +0000
          Re: Wish to try Linux Stef <not@this.address.com> - 2013-05-11 03:59 +0000
            Re: Wish to try Linux Michael Black <et472@ncf.ca> - 2013-05-11 00:27 -0400
              Re: Wish to try Linux notbob <notbob@nothome.com> - 2013-05-11 12:49 +0000
                Re: Wish to try Linux J G Miller <miller@yoyo.ORG> - 2013-05-11 12:56 +0000
                Re: Wish to try Linux Aragorn <thorongil@telenet.be.invalid> - 2013-05-11 15:20 +0200
                Re: Wish to try Linux notbob <notbob@nothome.com> - 2013-05-11 14:14 +0000
                Re: Wish to try Linux Jean-David Beyer <jeandavid8@verizon.net> - 2013-05-11 10:30 -0400
                Re: Wish to try Linux  OOps Jean-David Beyer <jeandavid8@verizon.net> - 2013-05-11 10:38 -0400
                Re: Wish to try Linux  OOps Robert Riches <spamtrap42@jacob21819.net> - 2013-05-12 04:37 +0000
                Re: Wish to try Linux Michael Black <et472@ncf.ca> - 2013-05-11 13:47 -0400
    Re: Wish to try Linux Peter Percival <peterxpercival@hotmail.com> - 2013-05-10 16:58 +0100
  Re: Wish to try Linux Aragorn <stryder@telenet.be.invalid> - 2013-05-10 06:53 +0200
    Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-05-10 07:26 +0100
      Re: Wish to try Linux Aragorn <stryder@telenet.be.invalid> - 2013-05-10 09:18 +0200
        Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-05-10 10:20 +0100
          Re: Wish to try Linux Aragorn <stryder@telenet.be.invalid> - 2013-05-10 11:40 +0200
      Re: Wish to try Linux Octothorpe <Octothorpe@invalid.com> - 2013-05-10 07:44 -0400
        Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-05-10 13:00 +0100
          Re: Wish to try Linux Octothorpe <Octothorpe@invalid.com> - 2013-05-10 08:47 -0400
            Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-05-10 15:50 +0100
    Re: Wish to try Linux Peter Percival <peterxpercival@hotmail.com> - 2013-06-21 18:44 +0100
      Re: Wish to try Linux Aragorn <thorongil@telenet.be.invalid> - 2013-06-21 19:53 +0200
        Re: Wish to try Linux Peter Percival <peterxpercival@hotmail.com> - 2013-06-21 18:55 +0100
          Re: Wish to try Linux Aragorn <thorongil@telenet.be.invalid> - 2013-06-21 20:05 +0200
      Re: Wish to try Linux Richard Kettlewell <rjk@greenend.org.uk> - 2013-06-21 19:17 +0100
        Re: Wish to try Linux Peter Percival <peterxpercival@hotmail.com> - 2013-06-21 19:56 +0100
          Re: Wish to try Linux Peter Percival <peterxpercival@hotmail.com> - 2013-06-21 19:59 +0100
      Re: Wish to try Linux Antti Talsta <atalsta@gmail.com> - 2013-06-21 21:04 +0300
      Re: Wish to try Linux Michael Black <et472@ncf.ca> - 2013-06-21 17:51 -0400
      Re: Wish to try Linux Roger Blake <rogblake@iname.invalid> - 2013-06-22 01:48 +0000
      Re: Wish to try Linux Stan Bischof <stan@worldbadminton.com> - 2013-06-24 16:48 +0000
      Re: Wish to try Linux Stan Bischof <stan@worldbadminton.com> - 2013-06-24 16:56 +0000
  Re: Wish to try Linux DenverD <DenverD@invalid.dk> - 2013-05-10 09:17 +0200
  Re: Wish to try Linux lichtblitz <nospam@lichtblitz.invalid> - 2013-05-10 13:49 +0000
    Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-05-10 15:48 +0100
      Re: Wish to try Linux Robert Heller <heller@deepsoft.com> - 2013-05-10 11:21 -0500
        Re: Wish to try Linux lichtblitz <nospam@lichtblitz.invalid> - 2013-05-10 18:20 +0000
          Re: Wish to try Linux Richard Kettlewell <rjk@greenend.org.uk> - 2013-05-10 19:54 +0100
          Re: Wish to try Linux Jean-David Beyer <jeandavid8@verizon.net> - 2013-05-10 14:55 -0400
          Re: Wish to try Linux Aragorn <stryder@telenet.be.invalid> - 2013-05-11 05:40 +0200
            Re: Wish to try Linux Jean-David Beyer <jeandavid8@verizon.net> - 2013-05-11 07:55 -0400
    Re: Wish to try Linux J G Miller <miller@yoyo.ORG> - 2013-05-10 16:07 +0000
      Re: Wish to try Linux lichtblitz <nospam@lichtblitz.invalid> - 2013-05-10 18:29 +0000
        Re: Wish to try Linux J G Miller <miller@yoyo.ORG> - 2013-05-10 19:48 +0000
  Re: Wish to try Linux David Hough <noone$$@llondel.org> - 2013-05-10 18:13 +0100
  Re: Wish to try Linux Dirk Weber <dma-weber@globe.lu> - 2013-05-10 19:09 +0200
  Re: Wish to try Linux Peter Percival <peterxpercival@hotmail.com> - 2013-05-14 19:01 +0100
    Re: Wish to try Linux Peter Percival <peterxpercival@hotmail.com> - 2013-06-23 22:55 +0100
      Re: Wish to try Linux The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> - 2013-06-24 00:34 +0100
        Re: Wish to try Linux John Hasler <jhasler@newsguy.com> - 2013-06-23 19:23 -0500
          Re: Wish to try Linux David Brown <david.brown@removethis.hesbynett.no> - 2013-06-25 18:50 +0200
      Re: Wish to try Linux bruce.sinclair@NOSPAMORELSEagresearch.NOTco.NOTnz (Bruce Sinclair) - 2013-06-23 22:53 +0000
        Re: Wish to try Linux Peter Percival <peterxpercival@hotmail.com> - 2013-06-25 12:24 +0100
          Re: Wish to try Linux Michael Black <et472@ncf.ca> - 2013-06-25 12:28 -0400
          Re: Wish to try Linux bruce.sinclair@NOSPAMORELSEagresearch.NOTco.NOTnz (Bruce Sinclair) - 2013-06-25 23:11 +0000
      Re: Wish to try Linux John Hasler <jhasler@newsguy.com> - 2013-06-23 19:30 -0500
        Re: Wish to try Linux Ross Maloney <rmatycorp@iinet.net.au> - 2013-06-24 11:07 +0800
        Re: Wish to try Linux Peter Percival <peterxpercival@hotmail.com> - 2013-06-25 12:52 +0100

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