Now that NASA is moving a large number of their systems from Windows to Linux.
I was browsing their site for any bonus material.
They posted some linux things but here was some posting on top performance adjustments in Linux.
I have not made the settings suggested. But I thought it interesting enough to post a link here to the NASA web page on it.
http://www.nas.nasa.gov/hecc/support/kb/Optional-Advanced-Tuning-for-Linux_138.html