Re: [rhn-users] system load average and top

[Ken Snider <ksnider flarn com>]

Mr.Anderson wrote:

> Wow, I'm glad you pointed this out. It makes sense and is completely true.

A load average is literally the number of processes "running" during any 
given sample interval. The Linux kernel determines this load every 10 
seconds or so, and averages this over a minute (so six samples). That 
becomes your one minute load average.

It has *absolutely* nothing *whatsoever* to do with CPU utilization. If you 
have 100 processes blocking on IO, it is fully possible to have a load of 
100 and a CPU utilization of nearly 0%.

--
Ken Snider