Linux Arch Linux discussion thread

A question to all ArchLinux 64bit users out there: Would 1GB RAM be enough to run 64bit ?

I've run 32bit on my desktop for an year or two (1GB DDR-400, 2.66GHz P4). Planning to install it on laptop as well to replace the pathetically bloated Linux Mint KDE 64bit. Lappy has 2.2GHz T4400 Penryn Pentium Dual Core with 1MB L2 and 1GB DDR2-800 RAM. Wondering weather to install 32bit or 64bit. 32 would mean slower performance when using Pro Audio tools like Jack which I need to. But if 64bit slows the whole system down due to excessive RAM usage, I'm willing to live with 32bit...
 
Well P4 Prescott DOES support 64bit and it says so on the box (which I still have lol)... but this is not for the desktop. This for my laptop which has a Penryn architecture Pentium Dual Core.

Anyway, performance is not about memory size right ? 64bit speeds up execution of mathematical operations and operations involving array-processing of large amounts of data (like applying XOR operation on an entire block of memory to encrypt it) because it can process double the data in one clock cycle compared to 32bit. This translates to better performance in multimedia and databases and stuff like that.

But as a consequence, all pointer variables are 8 bytes in size (to address the extra RAM) instead of 4 bytes and this results in 64bit OSes having a larger memory footprint compared to 32bit OSes.

And for regular usage, this makes no sense at all and the only advantage of going 64-bit is bigger RAM size and higher capacity. So people with even exactly 4GB RAM its better to go 32bit due to its smaller memory footprint for regular tasks. But since I'm using my laptop for all sorts of things from encryption to databases to servers (bought this machine to help with my B.Tech in CSE lol) and realtime audio with JACK and rt-linux. I think 64bit would make sense for me.

All I'm worried about is if ArchLinux can run on 1GB RAM or not. I'll be using Xfce Desktop along with KDE. Also RatPoison and IceWM as window managers when I need a lighter interface to use.

32bit ArchLinux currently uses under 64mb RAM when booted into IceWM and Conky. But I am not so sure how the other applications will fare...
 
Ok can someone please post the output of their rc.conf file. It now has some new configuration system. I'm posting the output of my file.

Code: 
#

# /etc/rc.conf - Main Configuration for Arch Linux

#

# -----------------------------------------------------------------------

# LOCALIZATION

# -----------------------------------------------------------------------

#

# LOCALE: available languages can be listed with the 'locale -a' command

# DAEMON_LOCALE: If set to 'yes', use $LOCALE as the locale during daemon

# startup and during the boot process. If set to 'no', the C locale is used.

# HARDWARECLOCK: set to "UTC" or "localtime", any other value will result

#   in the hardware clock being left untouched (useful for virtualization)

#   Note: Using "localtime" is discouraged.

# TIMEZONE: timezones are found in /usr/share/zoneinfo

# KEYMAP: keymaps are found in /usr/share/kbd/keymaps

# CONSOLEFONT: found in /usr/share/kbd/consolefonts (only needed for non-US)

# CONSOLEMAP: found in /usr/share/kbd/consoletrans

# USECOLOR: use ANSI color sequences in startup messages

# VERBOSE: Verbose level (from 1 to 8). man 3 syslog for level info

#

LOCALE="en_US.UTF-8"

DAEMON_LOCALE="no"

HARDWARECLOCK="localtime"

TIMEZONE="Asia/Kolkata"

KEYMAP="us"

CONSOLEFONT=

CONSOLEMAP=

USECOLOR="yes"

VERBOSE="3"

# -----------------------------------------------------------------------

# HARDWARE

# -----------------------------------------------------------------------

#

# MODULES: Modules to load at boot-up. Blacklisting is no longer supported.

#   Replace every !module by an entry as on the following line in a file in

#   /etc/modprobe.d:

#     blacklist module

#   See "man modprobe.conf" for details.

#

MODULES=()

MODULES=(acpi-cpufreq powernow-k8 cpufreq_ondemand cpufreq_powersave vboxdrv vboxnetflt usblp it87 addt7475 k10temp)

# Udev settle timeout (default to 30)

UDEV_TIMEOUT=30

# Scan for FakeRAID (dmraid) Volumes at startup

USEDMRAID="no"

# Scan for BTRFS volumes at startup

USEBTRFS="no"

# Scan for LVM volume groups at startup, required if you use LVM

USELVM="no"

# -----------------------------------------------------------------------

# NETWORKING

# -----------------------------------------------------------------------

#

# HOSTNAME: Hostname of machine. Should also be put in /etc/hosts

#

HOSTNAME="AX-64"

# Use 'ip addr' or 'ls /sys/class/net/' to see all available interfaces.

#

# Wired network setup

#   - interface: name of device (required)

#   - address: IP address (leave blank for DHCP)

#   - netmask: subnet mask (ignored for DHCP)

#   - gateway: default route (ignored for DHCP)

# 

# Static IP example

# interface=eth0

# address=192.168.0.2

# netmask=255.255.255.0

# gateway=192.168.0.1

#

# DHCP example

# interface=eth0

# address=

# netmask=

# gateway=

interface=eth0

address=

netmask=

gateway=

# Setting this to "yes" will skip network shutdown.

# This is required if your root device is on NFS.

NETWORK_PERSIST="no"

# Enable these netcfg profiles at boot-up. These are useful if you happen to

# need more advanced network features than the simple network service

# supports, such as multiple network configurations (ie, laptop users)

#   - set to 'menu' to present a menu during boot-up (dialog package required)

#   - prefix an entry with a ! to disable it

#

# Network profiles are found in /etc/network.d

#

# This requires the netcfg package

#

#NETWORKS=(main)

# -----------------------------------------------------------------------

# DAEMONS

# -----------------------------------------------------------------------

#

# Daemons to start at boot-up (in this order)

#   - prefix a daemon with a ! to disable it

#   - prefix a daemon with a @ to start it up in the background

#

# If something other takes care of your hardware clock (ntpd, dual-boot...)

# you should disable 'hwclock' here.

#

DAEMONS=(hwclock @acpid syslog-ng network netfs dkms_autoinstaller sensors sshd @crond @alsa dbus hal kdm @cpufreq @cpu)
 
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