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Enabling DMA


Guest Scorpian
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Yes, description: ATA Disk

product: ST3320620AS

vendor: Seagate

 

[root@localhost lex]# hdparm -tT /dev/sda

 

/dev/sda:

Timing cached reads: 528 MB in 2.00 seconds = 263.37 MB/sec

Timing buffered disk reads: 240 MB in 3.02 seconds = 79.34 MB/sec

[root@localhost lex]#

Edited by Lexicon
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Guest Scorpian
# hdparm -d /dev/sda

 

/dev/sda:

HDIO_GET_DMA failed: Inappropriate ioctl for device

[root@localhost subzero]# hdparm -d1 /dev/sda

 

/dev/sda:

setting using_dma to 1 (on)

HDIO_SET_DMA failed: Inappropriate ioctl for device

HDIO_GET_DMA failed: Inappropriate ioctl for device

 

# hdparm -i /dev/sda

 

/dev/sda:

 

Model=ST9160821AS, FwRev=3.ALD, SerialNo=5MA37W10

Config={ HardSect NotMFM HdSw>15uSec Fixed DTR>10Mbs RotSpdTol>.5% }

RawCHS=16383/16/63, TrkSize=0, SectSize=0, ECCbytes=4

BuffType=unknown, BuffSize=8192kB, MaxMultSect=16, MultSect=?16?

CurCHS=16383/16/63, CurSects=16514064, LBA=yes, LBAsects=312581808

IORDY=on/off, tPIO={min:240,w/IORDY:120}, tDMA={min:120,rec:120}

PIO modes: pio0 pio1 pio2 pio3 pio4

DMA modes: mdma0 mdma1 mdma2

UDMA modes: udma0 udma1 udma2 udma3 udma4 udma5 *udma6

AdvancedPM=yes: unknown setting WriteCache=enabled

Drive conforms to: Unspecified: ATA/ATAPI-1,2,3,4,5,6,7

 

* signifies the current active mode

 

So is UDMA6 on?

 

 

This is what I get.Thing is most of the time the disk reads n reads for every action like when i play a movie or browse and slows everything down and stammers without giving a smooth control. I have 1gb of ram.

Edited by Scorpian
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Guest Scorpian
Yes, UDMA6 is the current mode, that is good.

 

Do you know how to see what services are active on your system?

 

What kind of video card do you have? Have you installed the proper driver?

 

Yes I dont see any unesssary services on.

 

$ top

top - 01:39:31 up 2 days, 8:28, 6 users, load average: 0.29, 0.66, 0.72

Tasks: 166 total, 3 running, 161 sleeping, 0 stopped, 2 zombie

Cpu(s): 4.9%us, 2.2%sy, 0.0%ni, 93.0%id, 0.0%wa, 0.0%hi, 0.0%si, 0.0%st

Mem: 967780k total, 915256k used, 52524k free, 128888k buffers

Swap: 979924k total, 335456k used, 644468k free, 366588k cached

 

PID USER PR NI VIRT RES SHR S %CPU %MEM TIME+ COMMAND

4840 subzero 20 0 196m 67m 26m S 5 7.1 2:02.66 firefox

3451 root 20 0 214m 114m 5928 S 3 12.1 184:18.83 X

5331 subzero 20 0 325m 27m 13m S 2 2.9 97:13.80 plasma

5864 subzero 9 -11 166m 5312 4512 S 1 0.5 71:57.67 pulseaudio

8612 subzero 20 0 70020 16m 12m S 1 1.8 0:01.82 konsole

9059 subzero 20 0 2264 1068 812 R 1 0.1 0:00.07 top

8 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0 0.0 12:57.72 events/1

5193 subzero 20 0 74372 13m 9m R 0 1.4 0:05.73 npviewer.bin

5854 subzero 20 0 45880 8860 4556 S 0 0.9 3:45.28 net_applet

28555 subzero 20 0 170m 27m 11m S 0 2.9 7:55.15 kopete

1 root 20 0 1732 508 480 S 0 0.1 0:02.71 init

2 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0 0.0 0:00.01 kthreadd

I have a GeForce 7000m 256 mb graphics card so that shoud be fine.

The drivers are perfect too.

And why does system monitor and top show different values of memory usage? also usage of 915256 for a few apps is a bit ridiculous i see this happen to me in knoppix and ubuntu y so?

Edited by Scorpian
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Mem: 967780k total, 915256k used, 52524k free, 128888k buffers

Swap: 979924k total, 335456k used, 644468k free, 366588k cached

 

Well your slowness is probably due to the fact that your system is using its swap file so heavily (335456k used). This is because nearly all your RAM is used up (915256k used). 1 GB is apparently not enough for your OS/DE to function properly. I assume the DE you are using is the new KDE? You may need to think about using a DE that is less RAM hungry like XFCE.

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Move two topics that are similar and how different.

I think you have a laptop on the nVIDIA chips that work to draw from memory the total memory. What type of cache. Such machines often require that a minimum of two memory modules. ....Lex

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Guest Scorpian
Well your slowness is probably due to the fact that your system is using its swap file so heavily (335456k used). This is because nearly all your RAM is used up (915256k used). 1 GB is apparently not enough for your OS/DE to function properly. I assume the DE you are using is the new KDE? You may need to think about using a DE that is less RAM hungry like XFCE.

 

Yea it does use the swap file heavily. But the apps that I run are minimal and when I log in my RAM usage is about 320 MB which i reckon is the net usage of KDE with no apps. Now the X and plasma together use 117MB so isnt that the net usage + the apps(dolphin+kopete+kmail+terminal) each one less than 50 mb when loaded and firefox 100MB cant my machine handle that. Is Linux + KDE heavier that vista cause i see vista handling all this with 1 gb memory w/o using its virtual memory(But that doesnot make it better it's also slow). Also i notice the same in GNOME and KDE 3.2 ive tried them all. XFCE no though.

 

And is my graphic memory of 256 MB used at all isnt that what the basic GUI rely on?

 

Also I sum up the values "top" cmd gives and the net values don't match with the current processes sum of memory usage. by it does for System monitor.

 

I think you have a laptop on the nVIDIA chips that work to draw from memory the total memory. What type of cache. Such machines often require that a minimum of two memory modules

 

No. mine have 2 separate memory modules main memory around 1GB and video memory is 256 MB.

Edited by Scorpian
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So you have seen the same slowness and heavy swap usage with GNOME, KDE3, and KDE4 when running

knoppix, mandriva, and ubuntu?

 

Makes me think you have a hardware problem. Are there any warnings or error messages in /var/log/messages?

 

I am just grasping here, but I think I would try clearing the CMOS on my motherboard.

 

And is my graphic memory of 256 MB used at all isnt that what the basic GUI rely on?

I don't know.

 

Also I sum up the values "top" cmd gives and the net values don't match with the current processes sum of memory usage. by it does for System monitor.

I don't have an answer for this either.

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