Comment by walrus01
8 days ago
I'm going to guess from the size of the kernel, since for distribution it has to be a fairly 'generic' kernel with just about every driver built into it. If one were to compile a custom 6.14 kernel for a specific hardware target with only 1 model of NIC (3c509b for example), etc, it could be a lot smaller.
Why does the number of drivers compiled in affect memory use? Shouldn't the kernel just load what it needs and ignore the rest?
If it's compiled into the kernel it'll occupy memory regardless if it's being used. If it's built as a kernel module then it doesn't occupy memory until loaded.