Poll Do You Use Swap on Linux?

[lokamoka820]

Do you think swap still needed in Linux setup? If yes, what style of swap space do you use?

 

[Bot]

Yes, swap is still useful in Linux, especially for systems with limited RAM. It can prevent crashes when RAM is full. I'd recommend using a swap file as it's more flexible and easier to resize than a swap partition.

 

[Spiff]

I do use swap space, as that is still recommended, even with lots of RAM.
I use a swap partition, as performance may be better than with a swap file. Although, I don't know if one would notice any difference on a modern system with fast SSD(s) and lots of RAM.

 

[lokamoka820]

I do use swap space, as that is still recommended, even with lots of RAM.
I use a swap partition, as performance may be better than with a swap file. Although, I don't know if one would notice any difference on a modern system with fast SSD(s) and lots of RAM.

Where did you put the swap partition, in the begging or the end of your SSD?

 

[Spiff]

Where did you put the swap partition, in the begging or the end of your SSD?

Currently, I still use old hardware, HDDs, not yet SSDs.
My desktop system has two identical HDDs, each with a swap partition at the beginning of the disk space.
When I buy new hardware, with SSDs, I would put the swap partition at the beginning of the (fastest) SSD. I can't recall that I read any recommendations stating differently.

 

[lokamoka820]

Currently, I still use old hardware, HDDs, not yet SSDs.
My desktop system has two identical HDDs, each with a swap partition at the beginning of the disk space.
When I buy new hardware, with SSDs, I would put the swap partition at the beginning of the (fastest) SSD. I can't recall that I read any recommendations stating differently.

I use old hardware for my Linux with HDD too, it is faster than windows in the same laptop, what is your setup: distro + desktop environment?

 

[SeriousHoax]

In my limited experience, Linux's implementation of swap is far worse than Windows. Swap partition is very old school, swap file is similar to what Windows does, but swap partition and swap file both don't seem to be dynamic. From what I know it has to be a fixed value and cannot use more than that. Windows on the other hand can dynamically use swap file (page file to be exact which is more accurate than the term swap) as it sees fits. It can go over the recommended limit if required. There have been cases where a ram + video ram heavy game exceeded the VRAM I have on my system, and it made use of my swap file as an alternative. The swap file usage was over 6 GB every time I ran the game and became normal after exiting the game.

Not sure if Linux can do that since the value is fixed. It usually can't also hibernate if the swap partition or swap file value is not equal to the system ram while Windows can always hibernate as long as the option is enabled and there's enough empty space in the C drive.

On Linux I'm now using zRam which is a good concept of compressing ram to free up space for more. I guess Windows already and always uses memory compression by default, but the implementation is quite different, I think. I know Fedora and PopOS use zram by default, don't know if anyone else does.
The benefit of zram is less disk writes + faster swapping/paging due to ram being much faster than SSD/HDD.
Correct me if I'm wrong about anything.

 

[colin.p]

When I first started using ubuntu in "08, I religously did the usual separate partitions for /, home, swap, but after a couple of LTS upgrades, I said screw it and let the installer deal with it. Since I have used "Lucky Backup" to back up Home for years, I never lost anything (of too much importance) and got up and running on a new install lickity-split.

Now, I still let the installer deal with it including whatever it does for swap. Not sure if it's a swap file or partition but I think it was 2GB and have never been bothered by whatever the installer did.

 

[lokamoka820]

In my limited experience, Linux's implementation of swap is far worse than Windows. Swap partition is very old school, swap file is similar to what Windows does, but swap partition and swap file both don't seem to be dynamic. From what I know it has to be a fixed value and cannot use more than that. Windows on the other hand can dynamically use swap file (page file to be exact which is more accurate than the term swap) as it sees fits. It can go over the recommended limit if required. There have been cases where a ram + video ram heavy game exceeded the VRAM I have on my system, and it made use of my swap file as an alternative. The swap file usage was over 6 GB every time I ran the game and became normal after exiting the game.

Not sure if Linux can do that since the value is fixed. It usually can't also hibernate if the swap partition or swap file value is not equal to the system ram while Windows can always hibernate as long as the option is enabled and there's enough empty space in the C drive.

On Linux I'm now using zRam which is a good concept of compressing ram to free up space for more. I guess Windows already and always uses memory compression by default, but the implementation is quite different, I think. I know Fedora and PopOS use zram by default, don't know if anyone else does.
The benefit of zram is less disk writes + faster swapping/paging due to ram being much faster than SSD/HDD.
Correct me if I'm wrong about anything.

You have extensive knowledge about the topic, which gave me information I don't know about.

 

[lokamoka820]

When I first started using ubuntu in "08, I religously did the usual separate partitions for /, home, swap, but after a couple of LTS upgrades, I said screw it and let the installer deal with it. Since I have used "Lucky Backup" to back up Home for years, I never lost anything (of too much importance) and got up and running on a new install lickity-split.

Now, I still let the installer deal with it including whatever it does for swap. Not sure if it's a swap file or partition but I think it was 2GB and have never been bothered by whatever the installer did.

You can check your swap using swap command:

swapon -s

 

[SeriousHoax]

You have extensive knowledge about the topic, which gave me information I don't know about.

Not really extensive but some basics I learned from experience and reading here and there. I'm a newbie in Linux. My God the Arch Wiki is probably the most comprehensive wiki I have ever seen. A goldmine for Linux related info. 95% things go over my head but very useful for learning anyway since most info is useful for any Linux distros.
BTW, thanks for mentioning fish shell in another thread. It's my default now and loving it. I know zsh can be configured to make it work like fish but fish just works out of the box

 

[colin.p]

A decent info page that has all sorts of "tinkering" advice, including setting up zRam amongst others, is Easy tips for Linux Mint and Ubuntu Home Page

 

[Spiff]

I use old hardware for my Linux with HDD too, it is faster than windows in the same laptop,
what is your setup: distro + desktop environment?

I use Kubuntu, the Ubuntu KDE flavor.
Currently, I use Kubuntu 22.04.5. In probably another three months or so I'll do a 'partially clean installation' of 24.04.1, keeping /home.
But that is all rather off-topic in this Linux swap thread.

 

[lokamoka820]

Not really extensive but some basics I learned from experience and reading here and there. I'm a newbie in Linux. My God the Arch Wiki is probably the most comprehensive wiki I have ever seen. A goldmine for Linux related info. 95% things go over my head but very useful for learning anyway since most info is useful for any Linux distros.
BTW, thanks for mentioning fish shell in another thread. It's my default now and loving it. I know zsh can be configured to make it work like fish but fish just works out of the box

I remember many times ending in Arch Wiki for detailed information about problems I faced, one of them was fixing screen tearing on intel GPU, even Debian Wiki mentioning Arch Wiki as a reference in their website.
Fish shell is a must for me on every Linux setup, glad you like it, and Nala too on Debian based distros.