Hard Disk related query

I would like to know that if an user is running low on RAM, say 512 megs of RAM, does it in anyway puts pressure on the Hard Disk? As less memory means more read and write to the disk, I suppose, it will have an impact. But I am not sure. Your views please.

If the OS needs more RAM the computer will start using swap space on the hard drive.

The answer is yes.

I need to remind myself to save more things to my flash drive. I have lots of pictures saved to my computer for work, and I know that takes up quite a bit of memory. I have also been told to save them on Photobucket. I haven't done that, yet.

Thanks Aron for your reply. Do you feel that the current Linux distros take more RAM than Windows XP or one can tinker the pre-defined settings and force Linux use less RAM, which ultimately speed things up?

Linux manages RAM better. You will notice that Linux will use all the RAM to manage the system.

Swap space is good to put old pages and such that don't need to be in RAM for use.

Linux definitely manages RAM better. We run a dual system (Windows/Linux) using Windows only when necessary. We've installed a second hard drive to save to instead of using all the space on a flash drive. It works pretty well for storage purposes. It's good to swap out every week o so to back up files.

Said By trick-r-treat

I need to remind myself to save more things to my flash drive. I have lots of pictures saved to my computer for work, and I know that takes up quite a bit of memory. I have also been told to save them on Photobucket. I haven't done that, yet.

Don't confuse hard drive memory with random access memory (RAM).

Your pictures will not make much of a difference to the speed of your machine, and will not take up a lot of space in comparison to music and movies.

Said By Aron Schatz

Linux manages RAM better. You will notice that Linux will use all the RAM to manage the system.

Swap space is good to put old pages and such that don't need to be in RAM for use.

When I saw most of my RAM is used by Linux, I though otherwise. Thanks again Aron for clearing my understanding on the usage of RAM by Linux.

Yes your system will start use swap space on the disk. It shouldn't be a problem that you have things on the hard drive unless that is, it's almost full and then you have a problem. You should have two to three times as much swap space, as physical memory. So if you have 2 gigs of RAM then you need atleast 4 gigs of swap space. If you don't your machine can eventually get mucked up.

If an user increases the RAM of the machine then will it be possible to increase the swap space? If possible can you please tell me the steps.

A lot of RAM usage needn't be a great problem - it can mean faster response times etc. The problem arises when RAM is allocated to the wrong programs

Yes, that is why it is required to recognize the programs that are eating up RAM space and close them. The important part is this should be done after the user has sufficient knowledge about the process, otherwise it might result in system problem.

I would suggest the program Process Explorer by SysInternals to provide more reliable information and allow you to kill tasks off easier and find out exact paths to where a program is running from.

In addition to this, this app also has a great feature which is it allows you to search for what task is currently using a file. If you ever get a 'Cannot delete this file, it is in use by another program.' warning, this tool can help you find it immediately. Great for finding ActiveX/DLL based spyware that is linked directly into Internet Explorer or Explorer.exe