Grant writes: > From what I understand of how Linux handles memory, it > will fill it up as quickly as possible, and then free it as necessary. > This makes it difficult to determine how much RAM is necessary from > watching top. > > I read on this list that the kernel needs *some* swap, even just a > tiny amount, to function properly. Is that true?
Not really. Think about live-CDs, the usually do not use swap space. However, I heard that having at least a little swap space may increase performance, regardless of how much free RAM there is. Don't know if this is still true nowadays (if it ever was), I doubt it. > If so, do you think > it would be OK to put this tiny amount of swap on a cheap SSD? If you have enough RAM (with 4GB you probably have, but that depends on how you use your workstation), you can even put your swap into RAM. Sounds silly, but http://kerneltrap.org/node/3660 claims it makes some sense. I don't believe it, but I'm no expert. Wonko
