After reading your whole original post, I’m not sure if your question is ISP-related or RAM-related. So, I’ll operate under the assumption that it’s RAM-related, hence the RAM portion of the quote.
I’ve always been one of those people who subscribes to that old saying; “Unused RAM is wasted RAM.”
KUbuntu at 2.3 GB should be nothing to be concerned about unless your machine has only 4GB to deal with. Even on a machine with 8GB, you should be just fine. If you have 16GB or more, it doesn’t matter at all, IMHO
This is off-topic in the thread, I am just answering because I feel to clarify a few things and then let it rest.
I am mainly concerned about companies who openly communicate that their business case is to sell the data they capture from their users, namely google with their email services, their search engine, their DNS service and other services. User data is the product they sell. That is legal and that is public knowledge.
But my concern is not about criminal activities of companies like “Proton, Mullvad, Tuta or any other respected privacy respecting company” that you mentioned. They are all located in Europe and subject to legal framework in Europe: GDPR. If they cheat on their users regarding data privacy it is a legal offense. That is a totally different subject.
At least where I am, I know my ISPs are not only selling my data but collecting and using it in ways which I am highly uncomfortable with. Does using a reputable VPN provider provide an absolute guarantee that won’t happen? No. But there is much, much better chance of that. Especially if I am careful which legal jurisdictions those VPNs operate from.
It is also much easier to switch VPN providers than it is to switch ISPs. In many areas, the ability to switch ISPs is severely limited.
You do you. I don’t trust anybody anymore, quite frankly, and I just don’t care. The amount of mall ninjas within this space and my own infighting with my intern demons is frankly too great for me to give a shit about this anymore.
Looks like I sparked some lively debate. It gives me good food for thought. Talking to my ISP, in the end, they do not say much; just that it got blocked so it got blocked. Like they trust their blocker quite a bit. It could be that I need to say some better words to speak to a more engineer person. I do not know how much I want to bark up this tree.
I installed KUbuntu and installed EOS then ran free -m right after initial login with the results below. I left XUbuntu and LUbuntu out of it to save time and since I wanted to keep using KDE Plasma.
kubuntu@kubuntu:~$ free -m
total used free shared buff/cache available
Mem: 7749 1466 925 269 5584 5282
Swap: 0 0 0
eos@eos:~$ free -m
total used free shared buff/cache available
Mem: 7747 1329 5022 193 1853 6418
Swap: 0 0 0
Since the used amounts are not really that different, it looks like I must have been running something and forgotten about it. The ISP discussion was lively and gives me good food for thought. I am not sure whose post to mark as the solution. For me, I am moving on to continue with the rest of my setting up. Thank you all
Well, the buff/cache values do differ significantly. Which may need some investigation.
But could be addressed on the KUbuntu install. On the EOS install it looks unproblematic.
Other than that, you don’t have a Swap space ? If I’m not mistaken, a swap partition or a swap file, both would show up with their respective size in total / free. No clue in which way ZRam or Zcache would show up via free -m if that is what you’re using.
On a system with 8gb only, I would totally recommend to set up a swap space. Even on systems with more system memory. SWAP spaces aren’t outdated, they are still essential.
In terms of your ISP blocking mirrors, there should be plenty or mirrors and I would definitely look into rate-mirrors for instance it supports the Arch as well as the EOS mirrors. But both mirrorlists have to be taken care off seperately. Blocked mirrors by your ISP would be skipped and marked unreachable, excluded from your mirrors effectively. Other than that, you could consider the use of a VPN. As those may bypass the ISPs restrictive policies.
The fact that you are seeing more buff/cache in Kubuntu does not necessarily mean that something is missconfigured.
The relevant info is given by the size of the available memory. The kernel will drop the cache whenever there is a need.
Also there maybe other factors in play. Like how many services and daemons start in Kubuntu for example. Those may access many files at start up which later are kept in cache.
EOS, being minimal and close to Arch, starts less services at startup.
From my point of view unused RAM is a waste of money. If a system is using more RAM on buffer/cache instead of letting it sit unused it is a good thing.
1093i3511, I did see the rate-mirrors tools (Arch and EOS) on the welcome program. I did use both. Afterward, I looked at both the Arch and EOS mirrorlist files. Neither had the offending mirror listed yet my ISP still sent a malware alert/block for that mirror. I am not sure how or why. Even if another mirror routes to the “bad” one, the data is still coming back from that other one.
I have not had issues with needing swap so I just have stopped bothering with it.
cactux, Thanks for the additional diagnostics information. With that posted result, there was ~0.1GB difference between the two used memories which I am not really worried about.
mbod, I am not worried about unused RAM as my number crunching will use plenty.
I learned on and used Ubuntu for many years. Then I found Arch and liked it (and the AUR). With my ISP issue, I thought I could make KUbuntu work while just keep using the package scripts anyway (adjusting for package names). I already learned that I can swap Wayland back to X11 (better nvidia support) on KUbuntu. I made this thread since I thought there was some magic 1GB of RAM that EndeavourOS was saving and thus was providing for my number crunching.
Just a heads up, I don’t know how long that will still be possible, as KDE will drop X11 support soonish.
Depending on when Kubuntu will drop this version (ver. 6.8) you may sooner or later have to either get along with Wayland, or find a different solution
I already learned that I can swap Wayland back to X11 (better nvidia support) on KUbuntu.
Kubuntu 26.04 is full Wayland, but X11 is still in the repos, although it’s no longer officially supported.
It’s interesting that you have this experience, @purpleflame, because my experience is completely other way around. But most important thing is that everything works.
If you know which mirror is causing your ISP to send you a “malware alert/block”, you can add it to your /etc/hosts file, causing any attempt by your system to contact that server, to fail quietly on your computer. The lookup for that domain and attempts to connect to that server never leave your computer.
To do it, edit your /etc/hosts file:
sudo nano /etc/hosts
Add a line like this, replacing some-arch-mirror.com with the actual mirror’s domain name:
127.0.0.1 some-arch-mirror.com
So for example, the mirror https://ftp.energotel.sk/pub/linux/arch/$repo/os/$arch in your /etc/hosts file would look like this (domain only):
127.0.0.1 ftp.energotel.sk
The address .127.0.0.1 is your computer. So in effect, it’s saying look for this domain on your computer, which will fail (as expected), and of course, the lookup will never leave your computer triggering an alert at your ISP.
i,m am so impressed after recent update/upgrade my kde plasma de went from 928mb at idle down to 820mb on both my lenovo thinkpads,a little higher on the 7th x1 carbon but almost 780mb idle on the t490s,i mean this is kde plasma,i have not had it this good since i was running arco using a window manager,thanks EndeavourOS team,its nice to have good news for a change
I do not know how much I want to bark up this tree.
