Is 4MB Enough for Interactive?

[Peter da Silva]

In article <PCG.91Feb2205831 at odin.cs.aber.ac.uk> pcg at cs.aber.ac.uk (Piercarlo Grandi) writes:

The usual complaint about expansion swaps. Of course, the horrible VM behaviour
produced by the usual "malloc" and other normal C runtime routines... not to
mention things like Emacs... means on *any* UNIX system with a slow I/O
subsystem and VM you really do need as much real memory as the total VM used
by all your processes.

> If you want something different, try SVR4. Dell's is best, IMNHO, but
> you *must* have 8MB and an Archive 150MB SCSI tape with an Adaptec SCSI
> controller to install it.

Hold on, weren't you just saying that this memory requirement for SVR4
wasn't real? That it can actually live in *less* memory than SVR3?

> Otherwise there are Microport and UHC, both of which offer fairly sweet
> upgrade deals to those who turn in the floppies of their previous Unix,
> 286 or 386.

Not so, at least for UHC. You turn in your UNIX and you get the minimal
runtime-only version. No compilers, or nothin' else that they can unbundle.

> SVR4 seems to have better paging and swapping policies, and
> it is know to run decently in 4MB, *if suitably trimmed*.

Whereas SVR3 runs decently in 4MB without any particular trimming or tuning,
and can run in 2MB if you don't mind poor handling.

> Please note that swapping and paging are the *normal* mode of operation
> of a multitasking OS;

Not so! Not so! Swapping and paging are the normal mode of operation for a
VM operating system. Millions of people are using multitasking operating
systems that don't support swapping, and swapping is verboten in real-time
applications.
-- 
Peter da Silva.  `-_-'  peter at ferranti.com
+1 713 274 5180.  'U`  "Have you hugged your wolf today?"