title: Free Memory in Linux?
body: <p>When I run free command on my computer, I see the following output:</p>
  
  <pre><code>$ free -m
               total       used       free     shared    buffers     cached
  Mem:          1877       1802         74          0        125       1541
  -/+ buffers/cache:        135       1742
  Swap:         2047          0       2047
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>No matter how much I use memory, the <code>free</code> column in the 1st row always stays around 70 MB and doesn't drop below (I tried this by loading large files into memory, evident by <code>cached</code> being so high)</p>
  
  <p>My understanding is that Linux reserves some memory for the root user always. Is this the reason why the free never drops below 70 MB?</p>
  
  <p>EDIT: If this is the case, then loading the same files as root user should take up all free memory. Unfortunately, I've been unable to do this as well. </p>