Memory consumption exceeds all limits under Ubunut 24.04 with intel Arc

[bnjmnhg]

Hi @ALL,

I have an Ubuntu 24.04 with an Intel ARC A770 card for Sunshine and a Fire TV stick 4k Max and an Android-Smartphone.

Problem

When I stream the desktop and open a YouTube, for example, everything is fine. But as soon as I open a game, the memory usage is exploding. 2-3 minutes after i start a game my 32GB RAM and 33GB SWAP are full. At some point Sunlight shuts itself down, then the computer catches itself again. It doesn't matter what game I start.

Games

I have tried following games
‘Pankapu’ from Steam (Steam Play: Steam Linux Runtime 1.0)
‘Symohony’ from Steam (Steam Play: Steam Linux Runtime 1.0)
‘Cats Hidden in Paris’ from GOG (wine-ge-8-26-x86_64)
'War Thunder" from Steam (Native Linux)
'Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams' from Steam (Proton 8.0.5)

Sunshine

Sunshine was first v0.23.1 than updated to v2025.122.141614.
I have not changed anything in the Sunshine settings.

Kernel

I have tried with 3 different kernels:
6.11.0-1008-oem and
6.12.10-1-liquorix-amd64
6.8.0-52-generic (original kernel of Ubuntu 24.04)

Client / Moonlight & Network

On the FireStick I have the latest version from their AppStore.
The settings in Moonlight I have tried with differnet video resolutions (720p, 1080p and 1440p) and bitrates (40 - 100 Mbit).
Second Testdevice was a Android Smartphone with Moonligt 12.1 from Google Playstore.

All devices (PC, FireTV and Smarphone) are connected to 2 WLAN routers, these are interconnected via gigabit LAN. I don´t think that Bandwidth is part of the problem.

I can provide more info / logs or try out other tings, if you tell me what you need.

Problem Current summary:

Neither the kernel nor the client (Moonlight) or the game or the game platform or the type of execution (Wine, Proton, Native), or the Networtk have an influence.
One of the games even manages without a 3d graphics card.

A Workaround, without an explanation

I deactivated the second monitor on my PC and suddenly there were no more problems.

Examples

Here are some Screenshots how it looks like:
This one here shows what happens when i start a Stream wile game is already running, and what happens if the stream is stopped:

Here is a screenshot what happes when i start the stream including the corresponding sunlight shell output:

Edit:
I have continued to update the analysis and added a current summary

[ReenigneArcher]

Sunshine is the latest version from github. Reports as v0.23.1

This is no longer the latest version. Can you update and see if the issue still persists?

[bnjmnhg]

Updated sucessfull. Now it says: Version v2025.122.141614

But the Problem stays the same:

[bnjmnhg]

I have now tested with the original kernel of Ubuntu 24.04 (6.8.0-52-generic). The problem still occurs. The kernel is therefore also out as the root cause.
I have also updated the original post with the new information.

[ReenigneArcher]

If streaming desktop doesn't cause issues, then I think the memory usage is from whatever app you are running, not Sunshine.

[bnjmnhg]

I don't think so, because games work cleanly as long as no stream is running, but from the second I connect the stream from Moonlight, the memmory-usage start to grow strongly.

[bnjmnhg]

Ok, I have now reinstalled Ubuntu on an extra partiton. (Unfortunately I installed 20.04 first, because I didn't realize it, and then upgraded it to 24.04 with a release update; but I don't think that should make any difference.

I then installed sunshine and tested streaming to Moonlight with and without the game running. What can I say: You were right with your assumption. I could not reproduce the problem. So that's good news. It is not a general problem.

Nevertheless, I would of course like to continue using my original installation...
Any ideas what else I can try?

[ReenigneArcher]

I am not really sure what to try. I guess the first thing I would do is research if it's truly happening with any game or just specific games.

[bnjmnhg]

I tried again, made an apt purge and stuff like that; diddńt made a difference.

Then I tried changing the OS screen settings.
In my setup ther is one Monitor wich connected with two different cables at the same time and then mirroed by the OS. Once via Displayport and once via HDMI. (Don't ask, there's a reason for this, but that would go too far now).

After I deactivated one monitor via the display settings, the problem with the RAM disappeared.

So far I haven't done any further research, I'm just happy...

If your interessted I can still make logs etc. If not, I'll leave it aside and file it under ‘Strange things’.

Thaks to your help so far.