jon@netlabs.com (Jonathan Biggar) (01/19/91)
I have a network of 8 SparcStation-1 and 1+ workstations, all running 4.1, and all have their own local disk for swap space. One of the Sparcstations is the fileserver for /usr and /home for the entire group. On the fileserver, I have noticed that even when the entire network is idle, I often see the load average sit at a very constant level of 3 or 4. I have watched the ethernet and I don't see any traffic which could cause this, and top reports that only one process is in the running state at any time, and the system is running at 98-99% idle. Has anyone seen this situation? Jon Biggar jon@netlabs.com
ag@relay.eu.net (Andrew R. Gray) (01/24/91)
In article <1352@brchh104.bnr.ca> jon@netlabs.com (Jonathan Biggar) writes: >On the fileserver, I have noticed that even when the entire network is >idle, I often see the load average sit at a very constant level of 3 or 4. >I have watched the ethernet and I don't see any traffic which could cause >this, and top reports that only one process is in the running state at any >time, and the system is running at 98-99% idle. I have started noticing this on two Sun-3/280's, each with 3 diskless clients after we upgraded them to 4.1. The frantic (untraceable) activity continues for up to 30 minutes after they actually cease doing any real work. Is this some form on garbage collection that's carried out when the system isn't doing any real work ?