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Drastically Speed up your Linux System with Preload

techthrob.com — Preload is an "adaptive readahead daemon" that runs in the background of your system and observes what programs you use most often, caching them in order to speed up application load time. By using Preload, you can put unused RAM to good work, and improve the overall performance of your desktop system. Best of all, it's easy to install and use!

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  • QuantumAvatar, on 02/25/2008, -6/+44Hopefully they incorporate this in ubuntu as a default in hardy. That would definitely float my boat.
    • notque, on 02/25/2008, -1/+26This isn't the type of software you'd want in default. I certainly wouldn't. This is a choice you would make understanding the consequences.
      • brettalton, on 02/25/2008, -0/+2Well, to be fair, I said the same thing as Quantum, thinking of Con Kolivas and all of his desktop-kernel optimizations.

        What are the consequences, more memory usage? Yes. But what else?
        • luciferin, on 02/25/2008, -1/+4If your system doesn't have a lot of memory it will be slower (unless it doesn't use swap?), more random disk access as it preloads/longer boot process. Memory intensive programs will run slower as the memory fills up with pre-cached software.
          • Fergy, on 02/26/2008, -0/+2This will just use unused RAM and of course it doesn't use swap that would be stupid. And it won't run during the boot process. The only negative about this system is that the harddrive is used a little bit more.
        • sarixe, on 02/26/2008, -1/+1@luciferin: yes, but no problem for people with pc's that can handle the load. (even so, i'm not installing it)
        • KloroFormd, on 02/26/2008, -1/+3A simple install-time check box would solve all your gripes. Posting solutions is better than complaining.
    • nicku, on 02/25/2008, -3/+28Float your bloat you mean?
      • ZachSka87, on 02/25/2008, -1/+9Ah! A voice of reason!
        No offense Quantum, but one of the reasons Microsoft has built up such a hate base is because of their programmers thinking "Wow, feature X is really awesome. It'd be great if we installed it by default."
        I really, REALLY hope a distro as great as Ubuntu never caves into that way of thinking.
        • bruenig, on 02/25/2008, -7/+4That's what makes ubuntu ***** already. Too much default bloat and garbage. I mean I guess it depends on where your personal line is for what is overstepping the bounds, but Ubuntu has already caved into that way of thinking. For example: compiz by default? Really?
          • Fergy, on 02/26/2008, -0/+2If you would put in anything less than Ubuntu does you would get a really minimalistic distro. You can activate or deactivate Compiz with one click. But you must be someone that doesn't like extras like fast user switching, compiz, pulseaudio, tracker and maybe 10 years ago X.
          • bruenig, on 02/27/2008, -1/+2You can activate or deactivate preload with just one click too. So what is your point? This is not something which is needed and ubuntu installations generally require two steps. 40 minutes to install an hour or so of uninstalling garbage.
        • luciferin, on 02/25/2008, -1/+1Shut off with the click of a button though.
        • KloroFormd, on 02/26/2008, -0/+2@bruenig:

          Have you looked at the resources Compiz actually uses? On my system, it actually reduces CPU load for drawing and moving windows around, while giving me a much more intuitive desktop environment. On my old single-core Athlon64 OC@2.4GHz, it'd occasionally jump up to 1.33% CPU usage, while most of the time was around 0%-0.33% and using 30MB RAM with lots of extras. Compare that to a 40% CPU usage spike when moving windows around, and I can handle an extra 30MB RAM used.
    • ruddy, on 02/25/2008, -0/+17or you could type "sudo apt-get install preload" into your terminal...
    • joshzam, on 02/25/2008, -0/+8Don't count on it. Feature Freeze has already passed. Maybe for the Ibex...
      • sarixe, on 02/26/2008, -0/+1first time hearing the name. awesome!
    • Megatog615, on 02/25/2008, -3/+3Ubuntu has Preload by default in Hardy.
    • AriaGloris, on 02/25/2008, -2/+2 Now we just need ReadyBoost in linux, world domination inc!
    • QuantumAvatar, on 02/26/2008, -0/+1I agree this isnt for everyone but if you have 2gigs of memory that is never used its quite the delight. I hate not utilizing my 80 bucks worth of hardware.
  • trinatr0n, on 02/25/2008, -3/+4I know Preload what slated to be included in Hardy Heron, but I'm not sure if it's been pushed back to 8.10.
  • HugeAlReturns, on 02/25/2008, -17/+10OpenOffice.org Writer 15s
    Seriously? What system was he testing on, I have an old 1.8gig athlon with 1 gig ram and it does it in 5s.
    To be fair to the guy, it's a decent idea, but the problem to me is that systems with enough RAM to preload these things are the ones that don't need to preload anyway!
    • trinatr0n, on 02/25/2008, -0/+22If you took the time to read the article, you'd have seen the link that said the test system was:
      " Intel Pentium M 1.7 GHz
      processor with 2 MB of CPU cache, 512 MB of main memory, and a 4500RPM 60GB
      hard-disk drive. The operating system used is a stock Fedora Core 5 distribution, with
      Linux kernel version 2.6.17-1.2139 FC5, and the default I/O scheduler (AS)."

      I highly, highly doubt that OO.o cold-starts in 5 seconds on your machine, especially with those specs. Maybe you're referring to what the article calls a warm-start, which is when you've closed it, and then you re-open it.
      • HugeAlReturns, on 02/25/2008, -41/+2Lesson to the author - make your article a PDF and I won't read it. And it's 5s from a cold start - I rebooted to check.
        • Roryking, on 02/25/2008, -4/+24Buried for attempting to prove how big your e-penis is
        • smotpoker, on 02/25/2008, -0/+6Takes about 8 on my amd64 2800+ with 1gb ram (42% of which is free) to start oo writer. Perhaps your distribution's OO packages come pre-configured with some sort of 'quickstart' functionality so that part of OO is loaded into memory during WM startup and remains resident all of the time to help facilitate quicker loading (many programs in windows ask on install if you want them to load into the system tray on startup for the same reason)
    • ChrisRX, on 02/25/2008, -1/+7Actually OOo does load this quickly when you disable java in the OOo options.
      • HonoredMule, on 02/25/2008, -0/+4Yeah, everything is faster, lighter, and prettier without java. As a user first and programmer second, it's hard to appreciate its benefits.
    • Cerialthriller, on 02/25/2008, -1/+5my 33mhz 8mb ram system opens it in 3.15 seconds.
      • Smuikas, on 02/25/2008, -1/+4My amiga loads it in 6.02x10^23 seconds =/
        • derjames, on 02/25/2008, -1/+4that is the Avogadro number.... though molecules/atoms instead of seconds...
          • subxero37, on 02/25/2008, -1/+8Mmm, avocados...
          • tech42er, on 02/26/2008, -0/+2Moles don't only refer to molecules/atoms. You can have a mole of anything. But, when do you ever need to say you have multiples of 6.02*10^23 of something, other than chemistry?
    • Beakerz, on 02/25/2008, -3/+5OOo opens in about 1-1 1/2 seconds on my computer

      Core 2 Duo 2.4GHz (E6600 or w/e)
      2Gig DDR2 800
      320GB 7200 HDD
      8800GTS 640

      And linux only since last week - no more dual booting xp :]
    • bretkuhns, on 02/25/2008, -0/+3@HugeAlReturns: I got my budget laptop for $300 a couple years ago, and have upgraded it here and there since I bought it. I've now got 1.5gb of RAM on a 1.6ghz Celeron. Most of the time I'm sitting with ~900mb of RAM unused (as is true this moment, even with Firefox taking a leak with my memory and the tank known as Eclipse running). Preload has certainly come in handy as I have plenty of RAM to spare to help speed my poor old dog along, kthx.
      • HugeAlReturns, on 02/25/2008, -0/+0Perhaps there was a more sensible way of spending your money than on 1.5gig of ram to stick in a budget laptop?
    • beastlykings, on 02/25/2008, -0/+19 seconds for me with: 3ghz single core cpu and 1 gig of ram. 7200rmp hdd. 7.10 gutsy 32bits.
      idk, that a good time then?
    • DeusMachina, on 02/25/2008, -0/+1Hmm, I don't have preload installed a cold start for oowriter on my system (Core 1 Duo T2500 (2.0 GHz), 2GB RAM, 160GB 5400 RPM SATA hard disk) running Gentoo (using precompiled open-office) takes ~ 5 seconds (my measurement) to start up. Note that I have everything else is compiled for march=prescott instead of i386 as the binary distributions do, and I do have ldflags enabled.

      alex@localhost ~ $ time oowriter &
      real 0m4.229s
      user 0m3.376s
      sys 0m0.556s

      So Preload doesn't look like having too much benefit for me.
  • coheedcollapse, on 02/25/2008, -20/+80Memory usage is the main "problem" that people bitch about concerning Vista and this sort of cache is the exact reason that Vista uses so much ram. So...people will intentionally install an item that they endlessly bitch about when it's on another OS? So they are either uneducated about the memory use or just ignorant.

    In all seriousness though, cool program. I'm not going to install it any time soon, but it's still pretty cool.
    • selrahc, on 02/25/2008, -10/+21"So they are either uneducated about the memory use or just ignorant."

      Yes.
    • linkmeupscotty, on 02/25/2008, -3/+76You bring up a really good point that I didn't adequately address in the article. Preload /will not/ become a memory drain on your system. I've added some more information to the article, such has how to configure memory usage, and the example memory footprint on my machine, to show just how little (ironically) memory preload uses.

      Very good point you brought up, but I'm happy to say you don't have to worry about Preload becoming a memory hog :)
    • 4DFX, on 02/25/2008, -8/+41I've tested it and it uses about 10 megs by default... You can't compare that to Vista.
      • benitojuarez, on 02/25/2008, -5/+36heres the thing, if the ram isnt being used its being wasted.
      • Scaryclouds, on 02/26/2008, -0/+2I can and will compare it to Vista regardless of what you say and evidence you bring!

        Stupidity > Logic
    • andycr512, on 02/25/2008, -8/+14"So...people will intentionally install an item that they endlessly bitch about when it's on another OS? So they are either uneducated about the memory use or just ignorant."

      Or perhaps they'll actually do it correctly.
      • 6minuteabs, on 02/25/2008, -16/+3says the linux apologist... Another software example of zero innovation coming from OSS. This would never have been built if a commercial OS system hadn't shipped it first.
        • canthraxp, on 02/25/2008, -4/+15http://sourceforge.net/projects/preload
          Registered : 2005-07-08 15:03

          2005, Vista isn't like, 2007?
          • MioTheGreat, on 02/25/2008, -4/+5Microsoft was talking about Superfetch in 2003.

            There's been precaching software in OSes for years. Superfetch is just the first one that I'm aware of that takes into consideration everything from what you just finished doing, to the time of day, day of week, user logged in, etc. Even XP had a (relatively primitive by comparison) precaching mechanism.
          • MioTheGreat, on 02/25/2008, -2/+4(Forgot my source on the '2003' comment)

            http://www.infoworld.com/article/03/10/28/HNlongho ...
        • MioTheGreat, on 02/25/2008, -2/+1(delete).
        • andycr512, on 02/25/2008, -2/+5"says the linux apologist... Another software example of zero innovation coming from OSS."

          Do you want examples of zero innovation coming from Microsoft? I have a few for you.

          1. Tabbed browsing, copied from Firefox who copied it from Opera.
          2. Internet Explorer, copied from Spyglass.
          3. Aero (composited desktop), copied from OS X.
          4. Desktop Search, copied from OS X (and UNIX in general if you count LOCATE as indexed search, which it is).

          Last but not least, Windows. Let us not forget that your favorite OS was ripped directly from Apple, without whom it never would have been written.

          Still wish to talk about copying features and zero innovation?
          • 6minuteabs, on 02/28/2008, -0/+0Stop the presses. Tabbed browsing is the apex of innovation. And you mentioned Microsoft, not me. As Scaryclouds points out, you otherwise prove my point for me.
        • Scaryclouds, on 02/26/2008, -1/+1@andycr512
          You just proved his point, he said "commercial OS," you only talked about innovations from commercial software packages. You are right that OSS has a lot of innovation, but your argument to prove such was an epic failure.
          • andycr512, on 02/26/2008, -0/+1I wasn't addressing that part of his post. He complained about Linux using ideas present in other operating systems, and I showed that Windows does the same. It's also worth pointing out that not disproving a point != proving a point.
      • wolferz, on 02/25/2008, -13/+2The only way MS could do it correctly is to stop being MS and then release the product for linux... at least according to all the Linux Fanboys.
    • CalgaryTechGuy, on 02/25/2008, -14/+29"Memory usage is the main "problem" that people bitch about concerning Vista and this sort of cache is the exact reason that Vista uses so much ram"

      And even still it doesn't help the speed in Vista
      • insertAliasHere, on 02/25/2008, -10/+18I'm sorry, but that's *****. I actually use Vista (dual boot w/Ubuntu). On my laptop, when I had XP on it, Visual Studio would start up slowly. When I replaced XP with Vista, Visual Studio still started slowly. However, after a few weeks, I noticed that it was starting _much_ faster. Superfetch does increase the load speeds of your commonly used programs. And what good is RAM if you aren't going to use it?
        • zwaldowski, on 02/25/2008, -3/+6It is most certainly not *****. I put XP Pro on my brand-new 1.5 GHz dual-core (2 GB RAM) in a dual-boot with Home Premium. Vista always uses 60+% of my memory, while XP uses approximately 30%. Everything flies on XP.
          • insertAliasHere, on 02/25/2008, -2/+5YMMV, I guess. But my point was that even if Vista uses up a lot of your memory, it is putting it to a constructive use. Gauge the increase in memory when you start up a heavy, frequently used application. It is less than you would expect, because Superfetch has already loaded some of that app. And it should deallocate some of that memory when you load a program that you don't often use.

            The benefits of Superfetch are only realized over time. If you don't give it much of a chance, then don't complain that it doesn't work. Also, there have been lots of driver updates. For that matter, I did a full format & reinstall. I didn't upgrade from XP or keep the factory-bloated OS either. Maybe that's why I have good results.

            I'm not a MS fanboy (I use an apple as my home desktop, xp on my workstation at work, and vista/ubuntu on my laptop). I'm just telling the truth as I see it.
          • drouk1556, on 02/25/2008, -0/+4System memory is a cache, and an empty cache is a wasted cache. Zwaldowski and Calgary are both wrong.

            http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000688.h ...
    • canthraxp, on 02/25/2008, -1/+20I just installed this daemon to try it out. First, I ran various applications 3 times to measure the average time:
      Open Office Writer: 5s first time, 4s average, 1.5s preload
      Amarok: 6s first time, 5.5s average, 2s preload.
      Firefox 3.0b3: 5s first time, 3s average, 1s preload.

      Preload is currenlty using 444.0kb of memory.
      The subjective experience is: It's noticeable, I feel things run faster now. So I think I'm gonna stick to this thing.
      • mossblaser, on 02/25/2008, -0/+4Then again, if you hibernate your system stuff runs from warm boot all the time: open office is practically instant on recent hardware (so fast you cant even see the splash flash on to the screen).
    • colinnwn, on 02/25/2008, -3/+22Knowledgeable people aren't complaining about Vista memory usage. That is a gross oversimplification of their beef. People are complaining that Vista performs more poorly than XP when Vista runs on better hardware with twice, triple, or even quadruple the memory of XP.

      Vista on my newish Dell laptop with 2 gigs performs similarly to XP on my 7 year old desktop with 256 megs. That is the real issue.
    • wolferz, on 02/25/2008, -9/+12Wow! There is an debate going on here. I'm like... so happy right now!

      I have two points to make. First, in regard to "So they are either uneducated about the memory use or just ignorant." Very few people who claim to be computer knowledgeable actually understand computers. They can spout computer terminology like a gushing geyser, but they don't actually know how the things they are talking about inter-relate. Since linux users are predominantly "computer savvy" they also have the largest percentage of such posers. Even though windows still has more, it only accounts for something like 2% of Windows users, where it counts for something like 85% of linux users. This has resulted in a community overflowing with self-important opinionated asses who spout terminology to look like they know what they are talking about... but since all the other idiots in the community readily agree with them they refuse to acknowledge how ignorant they really are. (digg down commencing.... now)

      Next I would like to point to "heres the thing, if the ram isnt being used its being wasted." I thank you for fighting the beast and its bloated ego... but you're wrong. Free ram is like having free space in your wife's closet. Trust me you run out of space in you're wife's closet and you can be sure she's gonna commandeer half of yours. Not only will that slow you down trying to find your clothes every morning but she will turn that nag machine on full blast for you to do something about it. Free ram is like that. You may not be using it right now, but when you open up Photoshop (or gimp in the case of the linux/bsd users) and load up that 300 meg (uncompressed) ultra-high res graphic your company want's to use on it's billboards you better have ram to spare of you're gonna suffer as data has to be move back and forth to the hard drive which, with a huge image like that, takes a hell of a lot of time.

      Graphics professionals regularly have twice what the average user would have for that very reason. It just depends on you're computer usage. If all you're gonna do is browse the web you don't need a who gig of ram free. If you're planning to create high end graphics, full length high resolution movies, mix studio quality beats... or perhaps just make a quick PowerPoint presentation for an upcoming talk on the environment... you need ram to spare.
      • MioTheGreat, on 02/25/2008, -0/+18"You may not be using it right now, but when you open up Photoshop (or gimp in the case of the linux/bsd users) and load up that 300 meg (uncompressed) ultra-high res graphic your company want's to use on it's billboards you better have ram to spare of you're gonna suffer as data has to be move back and forth to the hard drive which, with a huge image like that, takes a hell of a lot of time."

        You should never notice a performance hit from a good prefetcher deallocating memory. It's not going to bother to page anything it's pushing out of RAM. It's just going to drop it. It doesn't care about reloading that data as it was, because it was just prefetching documents and apps, which it can still get to.

        It should be capable of freeing up memory the moment you need it very, VERY quickly. It doesn't have to read it back into the hdd, it just has to surrender it back to the rest of the system.
      • Fergy, on 02/26/2008, -0/+3Funny how you first mention that most people don't understand computers and right after that show that you don't understand computers but still think that it would be useful to say anything.
    • stix213, on 02/25/2008, -3/+7I'd still rather go the Linux route, where I get to choose if I want a time saving yet potentially annoying feature. I can either install the package or not.... With Vista, MS with their all knowing wisdom chose for me.

      I know I can go an disable it on Vista... But, wouldn't you rather have an OS that after you install it you can go through the list of all the goodies you want to install to enhance it to get it exactly the way you want it? Rather than Install Vista or XP and then have to go through the list of services and startup items that you need to disable to get the OS exactly the way you want it?
    • mithrasinvictus, on 02/25/2008, -2/+41 Maybe they are not the same person.
      2 There's a difference between having the option to install something like this and having it forced on you.
    • cdmarcus, on 02/25/2008, -0/+6Ubuntu, by default, WILL use up ALMOST ALL of your RAM. And that's a good thing... when you start an application, any RAM that's being used for cache that's needed for that program is given up, so the cache doesn't affect the speed at which things run. All that Preload does is manage the use of your RAM as a hard disk cache better, based on the applicaitons you actually use.
  • cjflashman, on 02/25/2008, -1/+6This is a brilliant idea.
    With the speed I already get, I had alwase thought this type of thing was built in with the kernel.
    Guess not :/
  • hendzen, on 02/25/2008, -8/+68So this is basically like Vista Prefetch?

    • nemilar, on 02/25/2008, -18/+9Actually, I think it's more like SuperFetch:
      http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/windowsv ...
    • nemilar, on 02/25/2008, -5/+39Actually, a non-microsoft.com link would probably be preferable:
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superfetch#SuperFetch
    • joepaterno, on 02/25/2008, -20/+17Yes, except it's for Linux so now it doesn't suck. It's great innovation now.
      • KloroFormd, on 02/26/2008, -1/+2Linux tends to do things RIGHT. Take composite windows for example. Compiz is WAY less resource intensive than Aero...
      • trenchfever, on 02/26/2008, -0/+1the last version is from 2006. long before vista. suck dick and die.
        • MioTheGreat, on 02/26/2008, -0/+3The first version was from 2005, though, which is 2 years after Superfetch was already in the Longhorn Alphas. (Also, Vista RTMed in 2006...so 2006 can't really be 'long before vista')

          What was that about sucking dick and dying?
          • trenchfever, on 02/27/2008, -0/+1linux warps the space time continuum.

            yes suck dick and die.
    • Jackar00, on 02/25/2008, -1/+6yeah, I was about to say, the first thing I thought when I saw this article is that it sounded like prefetcher for linux, and that there was a reason I cleaned out my prefetch folder in xp.
      • cdmarcus, on 02/25/2008, -2/+5It doesn't use up disk space like XP's prefetch folder. It's completely different.
      • chingy1788, on 02/25/2008, -2/+1wait
        so what does clearing it do and where is this folder?
    • SovereignGFC, on 02/25/2008, -13/+5Wait so Windows brought out a feature before Linux? Hell just froze over...
      • sirhomer, on 02/25/2008, -0/+17This software has been around before Vista came out.
        • estvir, on 02/26/2008, -2/+3Yeah, an early version ins in Windows and Microsoft has publicly shown SuperFetch (Vista) a couple of years before this "Preload" software was around.
    • empiric, on 02/25/2008, -8/+0Except, apparently, lacking cache-to-flash-stick that Vista has. Since I run Vista (work and gaming), and Linux (everything else), I'd love to see a true equivalent. It makes Vista considerably better speedwise--without it, I'd probably be back on XP by now. As most know, Linux is considerably leaner in terms of memory requirements as a baseline, but being able to speed up an old 256MB machine with a $20 2-gigabyte USB stick would be great.
      • mossblaser, on 02/25/2008, -0/+5Mate, for write speeds flash drivers are considerably slower than most disk drives and as such the use of a pen drive is purely gimmicky. On linux, just run with a fairly chunky swap partition and turn up your swappines slightly and you'll get a "boost" on low memory systems.
        • chingy1788, on 02/25/2008, -1/+1thats why vista tests them
          most cheapies give a pedestrian 1MB/s write speed
          then you have your kingstons, corsairs, etc which give a more decent 5 - 10+MB/s write speed
          • KloroFormd, on 02/26/2008, -0/+1Compare that to RAM speed. It's still not worth it.

            Flash drives are only good for so many writes... and Ready Boost makes them fail rather quickly. That little cash saved ads up quick when you start replacing flash drives.
    • ubergeek09, on 02/25/2008, -7/+5Of course the Linux/Mac fanboys will say it's in no way similar because anything that comes from Microsoft can't be a good idea.
      • jlnr, on 02/25/2008, -5/+1Dugg down because I haven't ever seen a Mac fanboy disregarding everything coming from Microsoft. It's mostly just Vista.
      • dwbell, on 02/26/2008, -0/+2MS has many great ideas, but poor implementation.
    • nmaster64, on 02/26/2008, -2/+7Except on Windows every other program you install (especially M$ and Adobe software) forces its own preloader down your throat anyway...
    • tcpip4lyfe, on 02/26/2008, -2/+2I like vista. I like ubuntu too. Up or down?
    • slythfox, on 02/26/2008, -1/+1Doesn't Debian obsess about prefetching already? XP and Vista already utilize such a technology, as well... I don't think it actually helps much.
  • TacticalPenguin, on 02/25/2008, -10/+2This guy's machine is ancient. I have a vaio with a 1.86ghz pentium m and a gig of RAM and it beats the preload times by about 50% each time.
    • nemilar, on 02/25/2008, -0/+11Don't compare the time in seconds; compare the % improvement.
    • i0scan, on 02/25/2008, -0/+1You missed this statement below the numbers... "Keep in mind these numbers were generated several years ago! Modern machines will probably beat these numbers in even cold-start times, but obviously will still see an improvement in speed with Preload!"
  • slightlygifted, on 02/25/2008, -60/+10drastically improve your linux system with windows, a real operating system.
    • smrekar, on 02/25/2008, -3/+20douchebaggery
    • sloppychris, on 02/25/2008, -3/+29I consider the stable, open, and resource efficient operating system the "real" one.
    • rootneg2, on 02/25/2008, -1/+20newsflash:

      Digg.com Uses a Fake OS
    • santaliqueur, on 02/25/2008, -0/+9Funny how most websites you've ever used aren't run by a "real" operating system.
    • canthraxp, on 02/25/2008, -3/+14Enjoy your DRM.
    • subgeniusd, on 02/25/2008, -0/+9I think "slightlystupid" is a more appropriate nickname for you dude.
      • peedeeramone, on 02/25/2008, -0/+5dont even disgrace the fantastic band "Slightly Stoopid" with that reference. but yeah. dbag
  • sohorrifying, on 02/25/2008, -13/+3what is linux?
  • stutimandal, on 02/25/2008, -14/+18I have a 2.0 Ghz Mobile Pentium 4 processor, with 400Mhz non DDR 512 Mb Ram laptop, and Ubuntu's latest build runs seamlessly on this 6 year old laptop.

    Windows/Mac lovers: Try running Vista or Mac on such old configuration machines, and then ask me to move from linux to windows/mac.
    • AnarkeIncarnate, on 02/25/2008, -4/+6if the RAM is 400Mhz it IS DDR.
      • albybum, on 02/25/2008, -1/+8"The first PC motherboards with support for RDRAM debuted in 1999. They supported PC-800 RDRAM, which operated at 400 MHz and delivered 1600 MB/s of bandwidth over a 16-bit bus using a 184-pin RIMM form factor."
        ...
        "With the introduction of the i840 (Pentium III), Intel 850 (Pentium 4), Intel 860 (Pentium 4 Xeon) chipsets, Intel added support for dual-channel PC-800 RDRAM, doubling bandwidth to 3200 MB/s by increasing the bus width to 32-bit."
        • chingy1788, on 02/26/2008, -1/+1thought RD RAM was *****
          high bandwidth yes but crappy response time, also high power usage
    • yabos, on 02/25/2008, -3/+2So what's your point? I have OS X 10.4 server running on my Sawtooth G4(originally 400 MHz) upgraded to a 1.4 GHz CPU, a 1TB SATA and 250GB SATA hard drive(via a PCI SATA card), 120GB PATA HD, 1.25 GB RAM(PC100), gigabit ethernet PCI card. My machine is 7 years old, older than your P4. I installed Leopard client on it and it runs perfect, I just need the server OS so I have kept it to 10.4 server for now.

      Check the release date yourself http://lowendmac.com/ppc/sawtooth-power-mac-g4-agp ...
      • ubergeek09, on 02/25/2008, -1/+5Why would you want to use OSX for a server? Linux and FreeBSD work on Macs too ya know..
        • Megatog615, on 02/25/2008, -1/+2Maybe they prefer the support from Apple? Then again you probably get more bang for your buck with some other *NIX.
          • Fergy, on 02/26/2008, -0/+2Why would Apple's support be any better than any other businesses?
        • yabos, on 02/25/2008, -1/+1Because there's many tools included that aid in the running of the server. And it's pathetic people dugg me down for my opinion.
          • Fergy, on 02/26/2008, -0/+2If you don't want to get dugg down you should make a real point with arguments and evidence. You upgrade a 7 year old server so you couldn't really call it 7 years old anymore. Next we were talking about desktops of course because any OS can run as a server on very low end hardware. You would want Vista on a pc with 512MB but if you would run Vista as a server on it you wouldn't really notice it.
            And you say that you like the tools? You should mention them instead of complaining about people voicing their opinion about your claims.
    • dwbell, on 02/26/2008, -0/+1correction, your CASE is seven years old. You can't claim the computer is seven years old when you've upgraded everything inside.

      you admit you upgraded from 400mhz to 1.4Ghz cpu, TB hard drives didn't exist 7 years ago (and are much faster now) and I'd guess you've added ram since 1.25 GB of ram in 2001 would have been worth more than the computer.
      • lilrabbit129, on 02/27/2008, -0/+1The harddrive space has very little to do with speed of the computer, so that upgrade doesn't count. Also, he upgraded from a 400MHZ computer ot a 1.4GHZ computer, which is still lower than what the parent mentioned.

        We all know that mhz isnt directly comparable, but in this case its close enough.
      • daverave999, on 02/27/2008, -0/+1This old broom has had seventeen new heads, and fourteen new handles in its time.
  • jongos, on 02/25/2008, -3/+9I'm running Gutsy Gibbon on an old HP Pavilion with 768MB of ram and a 1G processor. I'll take all the speed apps I can get, thank-you very much!
  • rootneg2, on 02/25/2008, -0/+13http://gentoo-wiki.com/HOWTO_prefetch_files_on_boo ...

    brought to you by Links for the Lazy™ (gentoo edition)
    • nemilar, on 02/25/2008, -0/+4that seems like overkill... but Gentoo loves it that way :)
      • vibrokatana, on 02/25/2008, -0/+12Gentoo has some of the best documentation around. I actually use their wiki alot even though I don't use gentoo.
  • Wakers, on 02/25/2008, -2/+7This is indeed just prefetch for Linux - one of the things that makes Vista eat up so much system resources, but is actually useful IF your system can handle it. If it works fine in Linux, then its a very good step forward.
  • 0Chaos0, on 02/25/2008, -6/+15Um. Great job for Linux however this is the same thing Vista implemented and MS has done in the past that everyone is QQing about...

    This is the equivalent of MS SuperFetch. Now the question is it more viable an option treating RAM as cache just because its on Linux or is it really being done better?

    Just wanted to put it out their I support both Linux and MS. But I can only wait till someone else makes the connection and starts flaming MS for it.
    • dallashigh, on 02/25/2008, -0/+19Linux and Windows operate very differently when it comes to RAM.

      Windows wants to keep as much free RAM as possible. For instance, when you're browsing the web with Outlook open in the background, Windows says "z0mg he hasn't used Outlook in a few minutes, let's page out the memory to disk!". And then when you click on Outlook, it takes 30 seconds to come up because Windows has to move the data back to RAM.

      Linux absolutely hates wasting RAM and it hates using the page file (swap space). As I type this, out of the 2GB RAM on my system, Linux is "using" 1286 MB with just Minefield open. But, 152MB is buffers, and another 805MB is cache. Take those away, and the system is only actively using 328MB. If load up GIMP and open a large image, Linux will reduce the size of the RAM buffers and cache to make room.

      The reason that superfetch is a double-edged sword is because of the differences I just mentioned. Windows will keep it's superfetch cache in memory and start paging out memory from inactive applications. The grind from paging can reduce or even eliminate any speed advantage gained from using the cache.

      With Preload, Linux will just reduce its buffers and cache when it needs more memory. That is why Preload is more beneficial than superfetch.
      • WarBiscuit, on 02/25/2008, -0/+4excellent explaination of the differences. thanks!
      • Fergy, on 02/26/2008, -0/+1But that isn't true anymore for Vista. Vista has gotten memory management like Linux has had for years. Vista uses a lot more memory than Winxp or Linux but that isn't worst thing because memory is so cheap. What makes it really painful is that Vista relies so much on the harddisk. It's constantly reading and writing to the harddisk and lets programs wait until it finishes. Linux seems to work mostly from memory and rarely reads or writes the harddisk. That's what makes linux or even winxp feel so fast over Vista.
        • MioTheGreat, on 02/26/2008, -0/+1"It's constantly reading and writing to the harddisk and lets programs wait until it finishes"

          Virtually all of the tasks that operate like this in Vista utilize Background i/o priority, which means it's going to instantly surrender the disk to any task that wants control of it. Those programs are not going to have to wait until it finishes.
    • daradib, on 02/25/2008, -0/+4Tuning swapping performance

      The backing store for a virtual memory operating system is typically many magnitudes slower than RAM. Therefore it is desirable to reduce or eliminate swapping, where practical. Some operating systems offer settings to influence the kernel's decisions.

      1. Linux offers the /proc/sys/vm/swappiness parameter, which changes the balance between swapping out runtime memory, as opposed to dropping pages from the system page cache.
      2. Windows 2000, XP, and Vista offer the DisablePagingExecutive registry setting, which controls whether kernel-mode code and data can be eligible for paging out.

      Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paging#Tuning_swappin ...
  • KomodoDave, on 02/25/2008, -2/+4...or, for full effect, use FaunOS which normally runs partially in RAM anyway, plus has the boot option to run the entire OS in RAM (if you have 1.5Gb RAM or more, for the latter option).

    http://www.faunos.com

    It's based on Arch linux, which was my distribution of choice - an i686-optimized, KISS distro with a superb community, fantastic package manager ('Pacman' - even has a cool name!) as wel as superb tools unique to the distro for compiling packages from source, if you wish to contribute (= 'ABS' - Arch Build System). Check it out. I'm now on RC4 of the next version, and it blows your socks off...
    • clos, on 03/04/2008, -0/+1dude, i agree, arch is the best linux distros ever, in the history of linux distros arch is the ***** *****
  • Quaterni0n, on 02/25/2008, -11/+2DO NOT WANT!
  • computershack, on 02/25/2008, -1/+3Excellent idea. My laptop has 2GB in it an half of it sits unused for a great deal of time so might as well make use of it.
  • vibrokatana, on 02/25/2008, -1/+5Linux already has caching and readahead, but this seems to take the concept to where it loads things at boot instead of as you use them.
  • phuchead, on 02/25/2008, -1/+2i used to use this with my gentoo box and i think it worked pretty well... I never tested it. I will have to add this to my ubuntu box, i forgot about it.
    -phuc
  • felderado, on 02/25/2008, -3/+5I used this like 4 years ago when I used Gentoo.

    I think Prelink is a better step forward than Preload.
  • myranttoyou, on 02/25/2008, -6/+1The preloader is soooo slow however. When does the preloader loader come out, then maybe I'll use it.
    • myranttoyou, on 02/26/2008, -0/+1Sorry, I meant to say the preload preloader, not the preloader loader. That wouldn't make any sense!
  • InorganicMatter, on 02/25/2008, -12/+4So Linux implementing this is a "drastic speed-up," but Windows implementing it (before anyone else, I might add) is "bloat" and being a "RAM hog?"

    Of course, since it's a Linux project, it'll be stuck in 0.x beta releases for its entire life and have a dozen forks before the year is over, not a single one of which functions without requiring SOME form of Linux voodoo magic to make it work.
    • Megatog615, on 02/25/2008, -1/+8Preload is optional. You don't have to install it.
  • dreamss, on 02/25/2008, -1/+1you can get this feature on XP (yuck vista sucks) using http://www.eboostr.com/ and a ramdrive. you will see a dramatic change loading games and apps. good stuff
    • chingy1788, on 02/25/2008, -0/+1OMG OMG OMG
      i love you
      Ready Boost for XP

      Edit, it fkn costs money...
      I'm going to go to the BT shop
  • wolferz, on 02/25/2008, -13/+5YAY! Linux is so cool. What? Microsoft has the same thing? Yea but it sucks! Why does it suck? Because its Microsoft! HAHAHAHA I'm so funny...

    You guys do realize that every time you guys go singing Linux's praises for doing X even though you just got done bitching about Microsoft also doing X just yesterday what I typed above is exactly what you sound like... right? Seriously can one person here describe in detail what about MSs Super fetch sucks? What is wrong with it?

    If any one says "It's Microsoft" or something similar may a thousand roaches infest your nether regions.
    • mwiriadi, on 02/25/2008, -1/+7You realise this was created back in 2005, just because someone has only just seen it now doesn't mean it's something new.
    • ubuntugamer, on 03/01/2008, -0/+0ok, the one for windows makes you waste about 1gb of ram and it doesn't speed up anything, at least this one makes the apps a bit faster for loading, and also, this was around about 2 years before vista, so therefore Microsoft copied it, and they did a horrible job
  • sirhomer, on 02/25/2008, -5/+5The reason I didn't Digg this story up when I first saw it is because I predicted 100 Windows fanboys will be like "LOL Vista can do this!".
  • SweetyCheeks, on 02/25/2008, -1/+6What about Prelinking? http://ubuntulinuxhelp.com/speed-up-dynamic-linkin ...
  • p51d007, on 02/25/2008, -3/+2I don't know about you, but I LOVE the prefetch in Vista. After installing it fresh, running the apps I run daily
    a few times, the improvement is dramatic. Takes a lot less time to open photoshop, firefox, acrobat etc.
    I love these stories about people bitching about the amount of RAM a computer uses. Isn't that what it is for?
  • RainStreet, on 02/25/2008, -0/+2Pretty cool. I'll definitely give it a shot on my laptop.
  • antdude, on 02/25/2008, -1/+1Is it a good idea for 32-bit Debian with KDE 3.5.8 on an ASUS K8V SE Deluxe machine with 512 MB of RAM and Athlon 64 3200+ 754 single core CPU? I know I need more RAM.
  • joeanon, on 02/25/2008, -14/+2The first sign of OS doom is upon you Linux users.

    caching/optimization programs to give you that 2% edge you've always needed in Open Office. Wow now it only loads 489% slower than Office.. that's progress.

    I find the real problem is usually a lack of RAM not that the system isn't using enough, though clearly there are times when you have to ask yourself why is this program taking forever and not using many resources, but usually it's the hdd your waiting for. This technology does have it's place, but it's not really needed in Linux.

    Linux already has some of the smoothest multitasking and lowest resource requirements around, it's the compatibility and ease of use that keep it out of the spotlight, especially the lack of gaming. It's kind of annoying seeing all this work go into 3D desktop effects for system that don't even have compatible drivers or having to use wine because WIN32 programs even emulated are better than many native Linux apps.

    Face it, if your using Linux as a desktop, your making a lot of compromises for almost no gain.
    The real problem is that IF you really hated MS enough to change desktops, Mac would be your best option. You get all the stability and security of NIX but with a smoother more standardize interface and much better compatibility including a lot of games.

    Apple's whole move to BSD in many ways undermines Linux as a desktop because it more or less has all the advantage of Linux and then some. Only a small demographics of nerds and poor people have a real need for Linux. Most families would be ripping themselves off to get a Linux desktop over an MS one. Losing all that versatility and the ability to trade games and apps with your friends.

    No matter how you spin it, if Linux ever gets good enough to replace MS it would have to be on a for profit basis, games and apps of todays standards cannot be made and kept up for free. Without the being free part, Mac really kills Linux as a desktop and since it's pretty easy to swap PC games and apps there are a lot of benefits the average user loses going away from MS.

    For now, the average use should just wait until the market share is more even unless they obsessively collect malware or such from their celebrity porn addiction in which case go to Mac, Linux is really not needed as a desktop.

    Imagine all the great open source programs we could have at commercial level quality cross platform even instead of a couple thousand distro's of Linux all based on the same bad interfaces and core apps.
    • dandelionmood, on 02/26/2008, -0/+1«Only a small demographics of nerds and poor people have a real need for Linux.»
      The last time I read that, it was meant to be a joke, and it actually made me smile. I think you're somehow missing the point by the way.
    • dwbell, on 02/26/2008, -0/+1When we say free we're not talking about money. Poor people, if they somehow have a computer, pirate software.
    • daverave999, on 02/27/2008, -0/+1ROFL! I left Windows because it kept falling over every half an hour. God knows what was wrong. That was even on a clean install. I can only assume it was a driver issue.
      No compromises for me on Linux. I still run Firefox, Thunderbird and Urban Terror. I still play poker online. I still download stuff and watch/listen to it. Oh yeah, and I saved 600 quid or so not buying a Mac to get a usable computer.

      Perhaps I'm in the minority though. Anyone else?
      • ubuntugamer, on 03/01/2008, -0/+0wow that sounds just like me, except I saved $2000 dollars because in order to run osx you have to buy a mac
  • SpookyET, on 02/25/2008, -1/+2The last reason is from August 2006. It seems to me like a dead project.
  • Megatog615, on 02/25/2008, -0/+10Why are you people laughing at how this is somewhat similar to the Vista Prefetch mechanism? Preload has been around much longer than Vista. If anyone has copied off anyone else, it's Microsoft.
  • jdigg06, on 02/25/2008, -0/+3I installed Preload for my Ubuntu 7.10 system (actually running virtually on a Mac with Fusion) and it made a noticeable difference with just loading the OS. Thanks.
  • DestroyFascism, on 02/25/2008, -1/+6I love Ubuntu...it took 2 seconds to install this.......lol at Windows...
  • AMDnVidiaATi, on 02/25/2008, -9/+2This is Linux catching up to Vista.... WHAT???

    Its called Superfetch and it came default on my Vista installation!
    • Megatog615, on 02/25/2008, -0/+6Thanks for reading the above comments.
  • chingy1788, on 02/25/2008, -3/+1ok diggers you love linux so much
    so...
    i have an 800MHz P3 with 256MB RAM (obviously no vista capable machine)
    now how do I make it into a nice internet using, media playing student machine?
    I got many ubuntu discs...
    so what extra programs are needed?
    • DontThinkSo, on 02/26/2008, -0/+2I would recommend getting something light like Xubuntu (you can always opt to install another desktop environment later if you choose - fluxbox for something *really* lightweight, KDE or Gnome for something with more features). Xubuntu will come with firefox for web browsing, but you can always check out other options in the add/remove applications dialog and/or the Synaptic Package Manager (which list the literally thousands of applications available by category). For media, I'm a VLC fan (available on windows as well), although it should come with a video player already.

      Really, it should come with most of what you need - anything else can be find through "Add/Remove Programs" or Synaptic. You may need codecs, though - simply try to play something with totem (the default media player on ubuntu), and it will ask to download codecs for you. Alternatively, you can search synaptic and enjoy all the codecs you want.
    • dahlek, on 02/26/2008, -0/+0As long as your configuration uses some kind of 2D acceleration like Xv, you should be able to run just about any media full screen at full speed, provided it isn't HD-sized content. To see if your setup is using xv, type this at the terminal:

      xvinfo

      If you see a bunch of output, you got it. Most media players default to using it and just about any media player will work fine - follow the other chap's advice and browse the available packages to install. My current personal favorite is Kaffeine with the Xine engine, but I also sometimes use mplayer. Both should be easy to install, though I wouldn't use Kaffeine unless you are running KDE.

      If you can't get Xv to work for some reason, go to the mplayer home page and look at their documentation. Use the "single file HTML" and then use your browser to find text in the page and search for your graphics card. There are usually options for getting some kind of acceleration going on most chip sets. Of course on the off chance that you have an NVIDIA card in that thing, you can use other kinds of speed-ups too - the mplayer documentation will cover that as well.
  • reginaldino, on 02/26/2008, -2/+1preload is a con. So far nobody has proved it's any faster. People keep blogging about how it theoretically works but nobody has seen if that's true. I tried it on 3 comps, no difference
    • wigren, on 02/26/2008, -1/+2Did you not read the article? Or did you just miss the comparison charts? I noticed a difference right away.
      • WoahAwkward, on 02/26/2008, -0/+0I haven't tried it so I can't vouch, but technically those charts are samples generated by the author of the program, and are several years old. If it seems to work for you, I have no reason to doubt you, but I wouldn't cite those charts as definitive proof of anything.
  • johnstar, on 02/26/2008, -0/+1I copy swiftfox to /dev/shm on startup it starts up fast! 30megs for instant load. (2-5 seconds on a 350 mhz vs. 12-15 without)
    hows that for prefetch!
  • digitallysick, on 02/26/2008, -0/+1You have to watch out for preload when you don't wear a condom , it could really slow your life down
  • aserer511, on 02/26/2008, -0/+1Awesome! SOmething OEMs who offer Linux as an alternative and need to movie linux units should advertise, if not bundle!
  • daguito81, on 02/26/2008, -0/+1If you have unused RAM on your computer, you don't have enough apps running at the same time. lol
  • hugejimmy, on 02/26/2008, -0/+1Will try
  • neko, on 02/27/2008, -0/+1My preload mechanism uses an ultra-smart heuristic to determine which programs to load into memory.

    I just don't shut down or reboot. Stuff on my desktop, stays on my desktop.
  • K1LLB1LL, on 03/01/2008, -0/+0Have been using Preload now for a few weeks on my stone-age Mac Powerbook 3400 with a 200mHz cpu and 64mb ram (a real powerhouse in its day!) It runs as advertised, certainly not during boot up as it only loads after gdm is loaded. Programs do load faster, very noticeably on this machine eg firefox would allow me the luxury of making a cup of coffee as it loaded, but after Preload was on the machine, firefox would be loaded up before the sugar was stirred!! Smaller programs (much more usable ones) are a snap! Typically, startup times are about 25% faster which translate to massive time savings which means, for me at least, I can't do the dishes & laundry now whilst I start up my xp virtual machine. Very annoying sometimes, but hey, the quest for speed and all that!! Bring it on!!
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