Running even larger LLMs on small hardware

In a previous post [GM4] we ran gemma4 12B on a 16GB RAM budget; today we'll push the envelop and run deepseek-r1:14b-qwen-distill-q4_K_M on the same budget. While last time we got away by fiddling with the model definition, today we'll have to reconfigure the OS itself (in addition to fiddling with the model definition). While … Continue reading Running even larger LLMs on small hardware →

Running large LLMs on small hardware: Gemma 4 12B on a VRAM-constrained Radeon laptop

Google released Gemma 4 12B today. I'm a huge fan of the Gemma model family, they have improved with each iteration and consistently perform on par with larger models. It didn't run at first because it needs more VRAM that my laptop has, but there's a workaround. Here's a short instruction for how to run … Continue reading Running large LLMs on small hardware: Gemma 4 12B on a VRAM-constrained Radeon laptop →

Linux tar –blocking-factor

I wasn't aware of tar's --blocking-factor parameter: -b, --blocking-factor=BLOCKS Set record size to BLOCKSx512 bytes. This actually reduces CPU load and backup creation times measurably. Figures for backing up 7GB on my home NAS: Setting Seconds Setting Minutes.Secods------------------------------default 1.18 512 1.071024 1.052048 1.08 The fastest setting (1024) is 11% faster than the slowest (default).

Slow rsync on ext4 filesystem

On a rather hefty rsync job between two local ext4 filesystems, writing on the target (a mechanical hard drive which should be able to sustain 100 mb/s) would fluctuate strongly (between 0 mb/s and 160 mb/s) and effectively slow down to a few mb/s on average after a few minutes. While I didn't find the … Continue reading Slow rsync on ext4 filesystem →

Nautilus browsing large windows share is slow

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When browsing large windows (samba) shares with Ubuntu Nautilus (that's the equivalent of the Windows File Explorer) I observed that shares which include many files and directories (a few hundred) take a few seconds to browse over WiFi, but almost instantly display over a fast LAN. A similar difference in speed is noticeable when searching … Continue reading Nautilus browsing large windows share is slow →