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Operating systems

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We are using XP on a core i3 540 @ 3.07 GHz processor platform and the RAM installed was 8 GB. We want to install COMSOL 4.1 into the systems. Will out of memory error problem error in COMSOL be solved with this configuration? As COMSOL is destined to be used in research lab, which OS and processor would suit for RAM of 8 GB and above?

3 Replies Last Post 13 dic 2010, 08:39 GMT-5
Ivar KJELBERG COMSOL Multiphysics(r) fan, retired, former "Senior Expert" at CSEM SA (CH)

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Posted: 1 decade ago 9 dic 2010, 02:13 GMT-5
Hi

check the XP and v4.1 compatibility in the relase notes, but for RAM and CPU's COMSOL will take what it finds available, so the more ram and CPU's the better (provided the RAM to CPU exchange speed is not saturating ;)

--
Good luck
Ivar
Hi check the XP and v4.1 compatibility in the relase notes, but for RAM and CPU's COMSOL will take what it finds available, so the more ram and CPU's the better (provided the RAM to CPU exchange speed is not saturating ;) -- Good luck Ivar

Jim Freels mechanical side of nuclear engineering, multiphysics analysis, COMSOL specialist

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Posted: 1 decade ago 13 dic 2010, 08:21 GMT-5
If your Windows-XP (or any other OS) is installed on a 32-bit machine, then COMSOL will only be able to take advantage of ~ 2 GB of RAM for a given model when solving (2^31-1). This is a limitation of the hardware, not the OS or COMSOL. If your OS is 64-bit on 64-bit hardware, then all the memory will be used by the COMSOL solver. I prefer Linux for many reasons, among which includes running COMSOL. Since I am an old FORTRAN coder, the code inserted below will demonstrate the concept (you can rewrite in your favorite language):

program test
implicit real*8 (a-h,o-z)
x=abs(2**31-1.)
xk=x/1024
xm=xk/1024
xg=xm/1024
write(*,*)x,xk,xm,xg
end
If your Windows-XP (or any other OS) is installed on a 32-bit machine, then COMSOL will only be able to take advantage of ~ 2 GB of RAM for a given model when solving (2^31-1). This is a limitation of the hardware, not the OS or COMSOL. If your OS is 64-bit on 64-bit hardware, then all the memory will be used by the COMSOL solver. I prefer Linux for many reasons, among which includes running COMSOL. Since I am an old FORTRAN coder, the code inserted below will demonstrate the concept (you can rewrite in your favorite language): program test implicit real*8 (a-h,o-z) x=abs(2**31-1.) xk=x/1024 xm=xk/1024 xg=xm/1024 write(*,*)x,xk,xm,xg end

Ivar KJELBERG COMSOL Multiphysics(r) fan, retired, former "Senior Expert" at CSEM SA (CH)

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Posted: 1 decade ago 13 dic 2010, 08:39 GMT-5
Hi James

I agree. I forgot to precise the OS decides first, no real use to run with >2Gb on a 32bit OS, if you are not using some virtual machine beneath, but anyhow COMSOL will not use more than the 2Gb on a 32b OS and that is really limited to at most 200-250kDoF in "client-server" mode.

And I see that the old Fortran stuff never dies out, just as us ;)
I havent either really catched up with C/C+/C# ..., to the level of my Fortran and assembler coding

--
Good luck
Ivar
Hi James I agree. I forgot to precise the OS decides first, no real use to run with >2Gb on a 32bit OS, if you are not using some virtual machine beneath, but anyhow COMSOL will not use more than the 2Gb on a 32b OS and that is really limited to at most 200-250kDoF in "client-server" mode. And I see that the old Fortran stuff never dies out, just as us ;) I havent either really catched up with C/C+/C# ..., to the level of my Fortran and assembler coding -- Good luck Ivar

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