MX 21.1 won't release RAM

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Tripi
Posts: 3
Joined: Fri Apr 29, 2022 3:33 am

MX 21.1 won't release RAM

#1 Post by Tripi »

MX 21.1 won't give back RAM when programs are closed.
Starting the system fresh, the system consumes around 580MB. After intensive use, for example reaching 4.5GB and then closing everything, the machine is consuming from 1.4 to 2.4GB. KSysGuard and Top don't show any program responsible for such a consume.
When MX 19 was installed the numbers always returned to the 680-750MB range. Given that my available RAM is only 5.3, this is not a minor inconvenience and requires to reboot the machine to start fresh again in order to enjoy some reasonable performance, otherwise the machine turns to use the hard drive intensively instead of to use RAM. :frown:
I tried upgrading the kernal to v5.16 but there's no difference.
I tried the command # sync; echo 3 > /proc/sys/vm/drop_caches but it only releases from 100 to 200MB, so the effectiveness is negligible.

Code: Select all

System:    Kernel: 5.16.0-6mx-amd64 x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 10.2.1 
           parameters: BOOT_IMAGE=/vmlinuz-5.16.0-6mx-amd64 root=UUID=<filter> ro quiet splash 
           Desktop: KDE Plasma 5.20.5 tk: Qt 5.15.2 wm: kwin_x11 vt: 7 dm: SDDM 
           Distro: MX-21.1_KDE_x64 Wildflower April 9  2022 base: Debian GNU/Linux 11 (bullseye) 
Machine:   Type: Laptop System: Hewlett-Packard product: HP Pavilion dv6 Notebook PC v: 078F100000205710000630100 
           serial: <filter> Chassis: type: 10 serial: <filter> 
           Mobo: Hewlett-Packard model: 182D v: 55.25 serial: <filter> UEFI: Insyde v: F.23 date: 09/04/2013 
Battery:   ID-1: BAT0 charge: N/A condition: N/A volts: N/A model: Hewlett-Packard Primary type: Li-ion serial: N/A 
           status: Unknown 
CPU:       Info: Quad Core model: AMD A8-4500M APU with Radeon HD Graphics bits: 64 type: MCP arch: Piledriver family: 15 (21) 
           model-id: 10 (16) stepping: 1 microcode: 6001119 cache: L2: 2 MiB 
           flags: avx lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 sse4a ssse3 svm bogomips: 15171 
           Speed: 1541 MHz min/max: 1400/1900 MHz boost: enabled Core speeds (MHz): 1: 1541 2: 1573 3: 1512 4: 1499 
           Vulnerabilities: Type: itlb_multihit status: Not affected 
           Type: l1tf status: Not affected 
           Type: mds status: Not affected 
           Type: meltdown status: Not affected 
           Type: spec_store_bypass mitigation: Speculative Store Bypass disabled via prctl 
           Type: spectre_v1 mitigation: usercopy/swapgs barriers and __user pointer sanitization 
           Type: spectre_v2 mitigation: Retpolines, STIBP: disabled, RSB filling 
           Type: srbds status: Not affected 
           Type: tsx_async_abort status: Not affected 
Graphics:  Device-1: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD/ATI] Trinity [Radeon HD 7640G] vendor: Hewlett-Packard driver: radeon 
           v: kernel alternate: amdgpu bus-ID: 00:01.0 chip-ID: 1002:9903 class-ID: 0300 
           Device-2: Chicony HP Truevision HD type: USB driver: uvcvideo bus-ID: 3-4:4 chip-ID: 04f2:b2f8 class-ID: 0e02 
           serial: <filter> 
           Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.20.13 compositor: kwin_x11 driver: loaded: ati,radeon unloaded: fbdev,modesetting,vesa 
           display-ID: :0 screens: 1 
           Screen-1: 0 s-res: 1366x768 s-dpi: 96 s-size: 361x203mm (14.2x8.0") s-diag: 414mm (16.3") 
           Monitor-1: LVDS res: 1366x768 hz: 60 dpi: 101 size: 344x193mm (13.5x7.6") diag: 394mm (15.5") 
           OpenGL: renderer: AMD ARUBA (DRM 2.50.0 / 5.16.0-6mx-amd64 LLVM 12.0.1) v: 4.3 Mesa 21.2.5 compat-v: 3.1 
           direct render: Yes 
Audio:     Device-1: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD/ATI] Trinity HDMI Audio vendor: Hewlett-Packard driver: snd_hda_intel 
           v: kernel bus-ID: 00:01.1 chip-ID: 1002:9902 class-ID: 0403 
           Device-2: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] FCH Azalia vendor: Hewlett-Packard driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel 
           bus-ID: 00:14.2 chip-ID: 1022:780d class-ID: 0403 
           Sound Server-1: ALSA v: k5.16.0-6mx-amd64 running: yes 
           Sound Server-2: PulseAudio v: 14.2 running: yes 
Network:   Device-1: Qualcomm Atheros AR9485 Wireless Network Adapter 
           vendor: Hewlett-Packard AR9485/HB125 802.11bgn 1×1 Wi-Fi driver: ath9k v: kernel modules: wl port: 3100 
           bus-ID: 02:00.0 chip-ID: 168c:0032 class-ID: 0280 
           IF: wlan0 state: up mac: <filter> 
           Device-2: Realtek RTL8111/8168/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet vendor: Hewlett-Packard driver: r8169 v: kernel 
           port: 2000 bus-ID: 04:00.0 chip-ID: 10ec:8168 class-ID: 0200 
           IF: eth0 state: down mac: <filter> 
Drives:    Local Storage: total: 4.22 TiB used: 2.74 TiB (65.0%) 
           SMART Message: Unable to run smartctl. Root privileges required. 
           ID-1: /dev/sda maj-min: 8:0 vendor: Hitachi model: HTS547564A9E384 size: 596.17 GiB block-size: physical: 4096 B 
           logical: 512 B speed: 3.0 Gb/s type: HDD rpm: 5400 serial: <filter> rev: A50A scheme: GPT 
           ID-2: /dev/sdb maj-min: 8:16 type: USB vendor: Western Digital model: WD My Book 25EE size: 3.64 TiB block-size: 
           physical: 4096 B logical: 512 B type: N/A serial: <filter> rev: 4009 scheme: GPT 
Partition: ID-1: / raw-size: 587.4 GiB size: 577.11 GiB (98.25%) used: 72.99 GiB (12.6%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/dm-0 
           maj-min: 253:0 mapped: root.fsm 
           ID-2: /boot raw-size: 512 MiB size: 487.2 MiB (95.16%) used: 349.4 MiB (71.7%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sda2 maj-min: 8:2 
           ID-3: /boot/efi raw-size: 256 MiB size: 252 MiB (98.46%) used: 274 KiB (0.1%) fs: vfat dev: /dev/sda1 maj-min: 8:1 
Swap:      Kernel: swappiness: 15 (default 60) cache-pressure: 100 (default) 
           ID-1: swap-1 type: partition size: 7.98 GiB used: 246.7 MiB (3.0%) priority: -2 dev: /dev/dm-1 maj-min: 253:1 
           mapped: swap 
Sensors:   System Temperatures: cpu: 71.8 C mobo: 30.0 C gpu: radeon temp: 69.0 C 
           Fan Speeds (RPM): N/A 
Repos:     Packages: 2584 note: see --pkg apt: 2571 lib: 1440 flatpak: 13 
           No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list 
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/brave-browser-release.list 
           1: deb [arch=amd64] https://brave-browser-apt-release.s3.brave.com/ bullseye main
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/debian-stable-updates.list 
           1: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian bullseye-updates main contrib non-free
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/debian.list 
           1: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian bullseye main contrib non-free
           2: deb http://security.debian.org/debian-security bullseye-security main contrib non-free
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mx.list 
           1: deb http://mirrors.rit.edu/mxlinux/mx-packages/mx/repo/ bullseye main non-free
           2: deb http://mirrors.rit.edu/mxlinux/mx-packages/mx/repo/ bullseye ahs
Info:      Processes: 256 Uptime: 1d 2h 40m wakeups: 4 Memory: 5.28 GiB used: 3.9 GiB (73.9%) Init: SysVinit v: 2.96 
           runlevel: 5 default: 5 tool: systemctl Compilers: gcc: 10.2.1 alt: 10 Shell: Bash v: 5.1.4 
           running-in: quick-system-info-mx inxi: 3.3.06 
Boot Mode: UEFI
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User avatar
Mauser
Posts: 1506
Joined: Mon Jun 27, 2016 7:32 pm

Re: MX 21.1 won't release RAM

#2 Post by Mauser »

I can confirm this with slightly better results on MX 21.1 Xfce with Hotop showing 1.12GB and KSysGuard showing 1.1GB RAM being used after I close everything. In my case this is not an issue for me because my Laptop has 8GB RAM and my Desktop computer has 24GB RAM which I use for heavy loads.
I am command line illiterate. :confused: I copy & paste to the terminal. Liars, Wiseguys, Trolls, and those without manners will be added to my ignore list. :mad:
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User avatar
Tripi
Posts: 3
Joined: Fri Apr 29, 2022 3:33 am

Re: MX 21.1 won't release RAM

#3 Post by Tripi »

Something interesting I just noticed.
With all programs just closed, instead of rebooting, I logged out. Then instead of showing me the black screen, the desktop with ALL the supposedly already closed programs were showing in the taskbar, it was just a blink of 1/2 a second, then the black screen showed up.
This makes me believe that there is a problem with the RAM pagination. After logging in, the RAM was still at 1,5GB.
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User avatar
Tripi
Posts: 3
Joined: Fri Apr 29, 2022 3:33 am

Re: MX 21.1 won't release RAM

#4 Post by Tripi »

I went back to MX 19.4. Problem solved. :happy:
An off topic commentary on MX 21.1. In addition to RAM problems I found that the "prt sc" button stopped launching Spectacle. Also after a week my wireless connection begun suffering from very slow speeds and constant disconnections. Add to that that the network manager won't automatically reconnect.
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