What does number in "Load" mean?

[jnovax]

Proxmox shows that the server Load is 1.57?
What does this means?
1.57% or 157%
I tried to google it but no luck.

 

[Nemesiz]

x y z loads :
x - 5 minutes average load
y - 10 minutes average load
z - 15 minutes average load

Ant its not % load.

 

[jnovax]

x y z loads :
x - 5 minutes average load
y - 10 minutes average load
z - 15 minutes average load

Ant its not % load.

In my example: It's 0.52

As you said, it means:
5 minutes average load = 0
10 minutes average load = 5
15 minutes average load = 2

is it right? if it's right? what does number 0, 5, or any number mean?
If it's a meaning number, there must be a maximum? for example 10, 100.

I just want to know if it's 0.52, 1.79, what is my machine performance? It's normal or overload?

 

[jnovax]

Why can't I delete this message?

 

[Nemesiz]

0.52 its X (not x y z)

Example:

nmz@vm:~$ w
12:30:18 up 3:26, 2 users, load average: 0.16, 0.22, 0.18
USER TTY FROM LOGIN@ IDLE JCPU PCPU WHAT
nmz tty1 - 09:04 3:25m 18.39s 0.00s /bin/bash /usr/bin/startx
nmz pts/0 :0.0 12:30 0.00s 0.08s 0.00s w

My loads:
x - 0.16
y - 0.22
z - 0.18

If load is above 1 its mean sistem is doing somethink.

 

[tom]

Proxmox shows that the server Load is 1.57?
What does this means?
1.57% or 157%
I tried to google it but no luck.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Load_(computing)