Im working on an streaming server and i need to have several pipes running at the same time, i started to do some tests to see how much memory and how much threads would something like that use on gstreamer. So i wrote a very simple application that starts a lot of pipelines, where the pipelines will be simply an faksrc ! fakesink. I started the tests and i realized that even for a simple task as running an fakesrc ! fakesink im using a lot of memory. with 1 pipe: Tasks: 2 total, 1 running, 1 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie Cpu(s): 51.5%us, 1.0%sy, 0.0%ni, 47.5%id, 0.0%wa, 0.0%hi, 0.0%si, 0.0%st Mem: 2027232k total, 963800k used, 1063432k free, 75976k buffers Swap: 995988k total, 0k used, 995988k free, 430676k cached PID USER PR NI VIRT RES SHR S %CPU %MEM TIME+ COMMAND 6402 katcipis 20 0 26204 4060 2548 R 99.9 0.2 0:48.04 multiple_pipes 6400 katcipis 20 0 26204 4060 2548 S 0.0 0.2 0:00.04 multiple_pipes with 2 pipes: Tasks: 3 total, 2 running, 1 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie Cpu(s): 96.8%us, 1.8%sy, 0.0%ni, 1.3%id, 0.0%wa, 0.0%hi, 0.0%si, 0.0%st Mem: 2027232k total, 965044k used, 1062188k free, 76804k buffers Swap: 995988k total, 0k used, 995988k free, 430752k cached PID USER PR NI VIRT RES SHR S %CPU %MEM TIME+ COMMAND 6541 katcipis 20 0 42600 4092 2544 R 95.3 0.2 0:16.22 multiple_pipes 6542 katcipis 20 0 42600 4092 2544 R 95.3 0.2 0:16.36 multiple_pipes 6539 katcipis 20 0 42600 4092 2544 S 0.0 0.2 0:00.04 multiple_pipes with 3 pipes: Tasks: 4 total, 2 running, 2 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie Cpu(s): 90.6%us, 3.1%sy, 0.0%ni, 6.2%id, 0.0%wa, 0.0%hi, 0.0%si, 0.0%st Mem: 2027232k total, 964608k used, 1062624k free, 77528k buffers Swap: 995988k total, 0k used, 995988k free, 430752k cached PID USER PR NI VIRT RES SHR S %CPU %MEM TIME+ COMMAND 6563 katcipis 20 0 51820 4116 2544 S 62.5 0.2 0:17.44 multiple_pipes 6566 katcipis 20 0 51820 4116 2544 R 62.5 0.2 0:16.36 multiple_pipes 6565 katcipis 20 0 51820 4116 2544 R 50.0 0.2 0:13.94 multiple_pipes 6561 katcipis 20 0 51820 4116 2544 S 0.0 0.2 0:00.04 multiple_pipes i have another test where i run an gnomevfssrc and a decodebin and the numbers are even worse: with 1 pipe: Tasks: 2 total, 0 running, 2 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie Cpu(s): 8.1%us, 2.7%sy, 0.0%ni, 89.2%id, 0.0%wa, 0.0%hi, 0.0%si, 0.0%st Mem: 2027232k total, 972104k used, 1055128k free, 78080k buffers Swap: 995988k total, 0k used, 995988k free, 430760k cached PID USER PR NI VIRT RES SHR S %CPU %MEM TIME+ COMMAND 6603 katcipis 20 0 43724 12m 5212 S 0.0 0.6 0:00.10 multiple_pipes 6605 katcipis 20 0 43724 12m 5212 S 0.0 0.6 0:00.12 multiple_pipes with 2 pipes: Tasks: 3 total, 0 running, 3 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie Cpu(s): 15.7%us, 4.3%sy, 0.0%ni, 79.8%id, 0.0%wa, 0.2%hi, 0.0%si, 0.0%st Mem: 2027232k total, 972604k used, 1054628k free, 78548k buffers Swap: 995988k total, 0k used, 995988k free, 430760k cached PID USER PR NI VIRT RES SHR S %CPU %MEM TIME+ COMMAND 6622 katcipis 20 0 53348 13m 5208 S 0.0 0.7 0:00.08 multiple_pipes 6624 katcipis 20 0 53348 13m 5208 S 0.0 0.7 0:00.10 multiple_pipes 6625 katcipis 20 0 53348 13m 5208 S 0.0 0.7 0:00.04 multiple_pipes with 3 pipes: Tasks: 4 total, 0 running, 4 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie Cpu(s): 6.8%us, 4.5%sy, 0.0%ni, 88.6%id, 0.0%wa, 0.0%hi, 0.0%si, 0.0%st Mem: 2027232k total, 974368k used, 1052864k free, 79328k buffers Swap: 995988k total, 0k used, 995988k free, 430760k cached PID USER PR NI VIRT RES SHR S %CPU %MEM TIME+ COMMAND 6960 katcipis 20 0 62136 13m 5208 S 9.6 0.7 0:00.04 multiple_pipes 6957 katcipis 20 0 62136 13m 5208 S 0.0 0.7 0:00.10 multiple_pipes 6959 katcipis 20 0 62136 13m 5208 S 0.0 0.7 0:00.08 multiple_pipes 6962 katcipis 20 0 62136 13m 5208 S 0.0 0.7 0:00.02 multiple_pipes i also realized that for every stream there is a thread, is there some way to use one thread for multiple pipes (or multiple streams)? is something that i did terribly wrong or it is normal this usage of memory? if it is normal, can i configure gstreamer to use less memory? considering that gstreamer works even in embedded systems i suppose im doing something very wrong on there is some way to use less resources. im attaching the source code of my tests, the simple one using fakesrc and the complete one using gnomevfs and decodebin. best regards, Katcipis