dhcp server make my server slow in wide ranges

[s m]

hello guys,
i'm using isc-dhcp31-server port on FreeBSD 8.2. i found that when our
defined range in dhcpd.conf file contains a large number of available ip
address (specially when i define network with mask 8 and have for example
16777214 available ip address in my range- i know it is not logical but i
test all situation that is possible), server uses a huge amount of ram
memory to initialization and running. if my RAM memory in not much enough,
dhcpd core dump.

i traced dhcp code and found when server starts, it assign a lease
structure for every available ip address in range therefore it uses a huge
amount of memory (i hope i understand correctly). this behavior is not good
at all for me because it makes my server so slowly.

my question is, first of all, do i understand the behavior of server
correctly? if yes, how can i change it to have better performance? if i
want to change the code in order to correct it- for example assign a lease
to each ip when it is assigned to a client-, is it possible or not (better
to say is it simple or not?:))

thanks in advance
SAM
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