When to Scale Up in RDS: Freeable Memory

When to Scale Up in RDS: Freeable Memory

Monitoring freeable memory will help you know when it is time to scale your Amazon RDS cluster. Freeable memory is not reported by the database, but rather by the OS. Freeable memory is the combination of unused and temporarily used memory. It is the memory that the system can grant without adverse effects. When an Amazon RDS instance runs out of freeable memory the OS may do up to three things._x000D_

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  1. It may swap some pages of memory to disk._x000D_
  2. It may kill a process to recover some memory._x000D_
  3. It may restart the entire system._x000D_

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This video shows you how to properly configure CloudWatch alarms for freeable memory to avoid potential problems.

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If CloudWatch seems too manual and you want to monitor your infrastructure better try out Blue Matador at www.bluematador.com. We are experts in cloud infrastructure monitoring and have built Blue Matador to make the lives of DevOps professionals easier. Learn more about our cloud monitoring solution and other CloudWatch resources at www.bluematador.com.