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    pfSense enable RAM Disk issue

    General pfSense Questions
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    • L
      linduin
      last edited by

      Hello!

      I'm attempting to enable RAM Disk on my PFSense box that I run at home. When I do, the system boots, but is unusable. Looking at the console it complains of /var being full, as seen in the screenshot.

      I have attempted both using the minimum values, and 256/256 for both. The system has 8GB of RAM, and plenty of it is unused.

      Has anyone ever run in to this? My googling didn't come up with any answers.

      I appreciate any guidance that can be provided!

      0.jpg

      Thank you.

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • provelsP
        provels
        last edited by

        Is this physical or virtual? And 8GB of physical RAM assigned to pfSense?

        Peder

        MAIN - pfSense+ 24.11-RELEASE - Adlink MXE-5401, i7, 16 GB RAM, 64 GB SSD. 500 GB HDD for SyslogNG
        BACKUP - pfSense+ 23.01-RELEASE - Hyper-V Virtual Machine, Gen 1, 2 v-CPUs, 3 GB RAM, 8GB VHDX (Dynamic)

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
        • L
          linduin
          last edited by

          Its a physical machine. pfsense reports 8029MB, some must be lost for things like the integrated video card.

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          • provelsP
            provels
            last edited by provels

            Well, that should be plenty. Even my VM with 1.5GB total ran RAM disks fine with 120 assigned to /var. It boots normally with /var on hard drive? If so, I'd probably try booting it that way, backing up the config.xml and reinstalling/restoring. Or maybe just boot it normally, reset all the log files, and try RAM disk again. You running pfBlockerNG or Squid? They both cache to /var.

            Peder

            MAIN - pfSense+ 24.11-RELEASE - Adlink MXE-5401, i7, 16 GB RAM, 64 GB SSD. 500 GB HDD for SyslogNG
            BACKUP - pfSense+ 23.01-RELEASE - Hyper-V Virtual Machine, Gen 1, 2 v-CPUs, 3 GB RAM, 8GB VHDX (Dynamic)

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
            • L
              linduin
              last edited by

              I am using pfBlockerNG. Doing some googling after you asked, it seems like using a ram disk plus pfblockerNG is a bad idea.

              I was trying to extend the life of the SSD that I have installed by using a RAM disk. With this new information I may chose to swap it out for a HDD.

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              • provelsP
                provels
                last edited by

                Before doing that, see if you can boot normally and set /var to 1GB. You have plenty of RAM. If that works, try reducing to 768, then 512. Maybe works. I had no trouble running PFB on a RAM disk, but every time I rebooted, the /var PFB data got wiped and I either had to wait until the next update or force it. Finally went back to /var on SSD. After all, the whole VM is on SSD anyway...

                Peder

                MAIN - pfSense+ 24.11-RELEASE - Adlink MXE-5401, i7, 16 GB RAM, 64 GB SSD. 500 GB HDD for SyslogNG
                BACKUP - pfSense+ 23.01-RELEASE - Hyper-V Virtual Machine, Gen 1, 2 v-CPUs, 3 GB RAM, 8GB VHDX (Dynamic)

                1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
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