Would Qubes OS run slow on a HDD with 8GB of RAM?

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Joe Smith

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Mar 13, 2019, 9:12:42 AM3/13/19
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Would Qubes OS run slow on a HDD with 8GB of RAM?

unman

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Mar 13, 2019, 11:17:48 AM3/13/19
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On Wed, Mar 13, 2019 at 06:12:42AM -0700, Joe Smith wrote:
> Would Qubes OS run slow on a HDD with 8GB of RAM?
>

Slow, but not unusable.
Restrict the amount allocated to dom0 by setting boot parameters
appropriately.
Restrict the amount allocated to system qubes - you can set these pretty
low and restrict maxmem.

Of course, you wont be able to run *lots* of qubes at the same time, and
undoubtedly you'll feel some pain sometimes, but for ordinary use it
will be fine.
I have an old x230 with HDD and 8GB and it's perfectly serviceable: I'm
using it right now and currently have 13 qubes open, and am building Qubes in one.
I ditched Whonix and replaced it with a TorVM, and can do pretty much
all I want. (disposableVMs can feel somewhat slow to start so I always
have one open in advance to ease the pain.)

Of course, your needs (and pain threshold) may differ from mine

unman


Chris Laprise

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Mar 13, 2019, 4:04:22 PM3/13/19
to Joe Smith, qubes-devel
On 3/13/19 9:12 AM, Joe Smith wrote:
> Would Qubes OS run slow on a HDD with 8GB of RAM?

The HDD is the main problem with this setup; I wouldn't recommend it.

Otherwise, restricting VM memory settings does make 8GB very usable. I
recommend 1500MB for dom0, 300MB for each service VM (sys-net,
sys-firewall, etc) and 700-2000MB as a rule of thumb for each appVM
depending on the apps needs.

--

Chris Laprise, tas...@posteo.net
https://github.com/tasket
https://twitter.com/ttaskett
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Joe Smith

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Mar 13, 2019, 8:11:39 PM3/13/19
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Thanks guys :)
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