Why does TargetLynx have a 2.0 GB memory limit ? - WKB28899

ENVIRONMENT

• MassLynx 4.1 and 4.2
• TargetLynx

ANSWER

Customer noticed that TargetLynx processing was slow and that TargetLynx was using only a small part of the total memory on the PC.

On a 32-bit operating system, processes are limited to 4 GB of address space. In order for programs to run properly, they each use an individual mapping of 4 GB (so you could have lots of individual programs all using 4 GB). Because this mapping is common, compilers and the operating system decide that 2 GB of address space in each process should be reserved for system-related tasks. That leaves only 2 GB available to be assigned by the process itself to memory objects it wants to create. TargetLynx will fail (as will most programs) if the memory usage goes to about 2 GB (depending on how much of the OS 2 GB is being used).

The 2 GB limit still applies when you run MassLynx on a 64-bit operating system, because MassLynx is 32-bit software and subject to the 2 GB limitation for 32-bit processes on 64-bit OSs.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

If TargetLynx processing is getting close to using 2 GB of memory, users are advised to process fewer samples in each batch.