[mythtv-users] Prebuffering Pause and memory

Michael T. Dean mtdean at thirdcontact.com
Thu Aug 28 19:15:06 UTC 2008


On 08/28/2008 02:41 PM, Brad DerManouelian wrote:
> On Aug 28, 2008, at 11:29 AM, Michael Wisniewski wrote:
>> I'm *thinking* my problem is not enough memory.  I have an AMD 64
>> 2.2ghz dual core processor with 1 gig of ram.  When I run the 'free -o
>> -m" command while watching live tv, my free memory hovers around 50
>> meg.  However, at the same time, it doesn't use any swap.  My question
>> is...if I add more memory to the machine, will it fix the prebuffer
>> pauses?
>>     
> I usually get the message associated with poor disk I/O, networking I/ 
> O, or bad source material (bad signal/noise ratio on OTA content). If  
> you're not swapping, it's not a low memory issue. It will swap if it  
> needs to. If you are swapping and getting the problem, it could be  
> disk I/O associated with swapping and more memory would help.

Right, so in your case--where the machine isn't swapping--the system 
only /looks/ like it's low on memory because the kernel is using any 
"extra" memory for disk buffers, rather than letting it go to waste.  
So, the real value for free memory that you should be looking at is the 
one reported in the line that the -o argument to free removes.

Mike


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