Difference between Redhat Linux 6 & 7
A quick comparison between the two major RedHat Enterprise Linux Operating System versions – RHEL6 & RHEL7. Below table shows a few differences between them.
| Component | Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 (Santiago) | Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 (Maipo) |
| Release Date | November 10, 2010 | June 10, 2014 |
| Kernel Version | 2.6.32-* | 3.10.0-* |
| Default Filesystem | Ext4 (fourth extended filesystem) | XFS |
| First Process Name/ID | init (process ID =1) | systemd (process ID=1) |
| Maximum File Size | 16TB | 500TB |
| Maximum file system size | 16TB | 500TB |
| Maximum subdirectories | 65000 | Unlimited |
| Languages supported | 22 | 22 |
| Desktop GUI | Gnome 2.28 | Gnome 3.8 |
| Minimum diskspace | 1GB minimum/5GB recommended | 10GB minimum/20GB recommended |
| Memory requirement (x86_64) | ||
| Minimum : | 1GB minimum/1 GB per logical CPU recommended | 1GB minimum/1 GB per logical CPU recommended (Note: Network / PXE install requires at least 1.5 GB of RAM for the install procedure only.) |
| Maximum: | 12TB (Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.7 is required for support of 12TB of RAM. Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.6 can support up to 6TB of RAM. Previous versions of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6, starting with Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.3, support up to 3TB of RAM. Versions of Red Hat Enterprise Linux prior to Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.3 support up to 1TB of RAM. | 12TB (Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.2 is required for support of 12TB of RAM. Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.1 can support up to 6TB of RAM. Previous versions of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 (i.e. Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.0) support up to 3TB of RAM. |
| Maximum logical CPUs (X86_64) | 448 (Note: Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.7 or newer is required for 448 CPU support. The previous maximum supported CPU count for earlier versions was 288 CPUs) | 768 (Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.3 with errata kernel 3.10.0-514.26.2.el7 or newer is required for 768 CPU support. Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.2 with errata kernel 3.10.0-327.18.2.el7 or newer is required for 576 CPU support. Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.2 or newer is required for 384 CPU support. The previous maximum supported CPU count for earlier versions was 288 CPUs) |