Implications of large memory systems

[Unix Consultation Mailbox]

In article <13433 at steinmetz.ge.com> davidsen at crdos1.UUCP (bill davidsen) writes:
> If the machine is a
>workstation rather than being used for timesharing (many schools try to
>put 32 users on an 8MB Sun), the total memory in use is probably 4-12MB.

We have a pilot system running on a number of single-user diskless Sun 3/50s
and I'll tell you exactly how much memory is in use on each of those
workstations: the entire 4Mb.  We had to double the size of all the server
swap partitions just to keep the systems running.  And even after taking the
-g's and -gx's out of all the makefiles, *and* stripping all the executables,
it's still Page City.

>Do most users need that in a workstation? I don't, as long as I have
>access to a large machine for those rare problems which can use that
>much memory.

I never needed more than the 4Mb in a 3/50 myself.  Of course I was still
doing most of my work on the Pyramids, which helps a lot.  (They've all
got >= 16M main memory and hundreds of Mb swap.  Zippy!)


phil