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Re: Kernel reports that I have 64MB of RAM instead of 256MB
Boaz Rymland wrote:
>
> Shlomi Fish wrote:
> >
> > Hi!
> >
> > I have installed Mandrake 7.1 here at work. When I'm using a kernel which I
> > compile myself and try to load linux by using loadlin, I encounter the
> > following problem: I have 256 MB of RAM, but free reports that I only have
> > 64 MB.
> >
> > Now, I tried both the 2.2.15 kernel that comes with the distribution (it
> > has some patches such as ReiserFS and supermount), as well as the vanilla
> > 2.2.16 kernel with the ResierFS patch. (My Linux partition is ReiserFS). I
> > tried to compile with both the 1GB memory limit and 2GB memory limit.
> >
> > If I load Linux by using the boot-diskette which I prepared during the
> > Mandrake installatation, I can see the entire 256 MB of RAM.
> >
> > My system specs are:
> > Pentium III 667 MHz
> > 256 MB of RAM
> > Two 15GB Seagate Hard-disks: one of them Win98 second edition and the other
> > Mandrake 7.1 linux.
> >
> > What am I doing wrong and how can I make sure that my custom kernel loads fine?
> >
> > Regards,
> >
> > Shlomi Fish
> >
>
> Sounds like the popular-and-easily-solved problem:
> You need to pass the kernel, at boot time, a parameter apecifying how much RAM
> you have.
> This is easily done with lilo (/etc/lilo.conf on RH systems):
>
> image=/boot/vmlinuz-2.2.14-5.0
> label=linux
> read-only
> root=/dev/hda4
> relevant line ---> append = "mem=192M"
> password="yossi"
> restricted
>
> I cant exactly recall the way you pass that parameter with loadlin, but you
> could easily find out with loadlin docs.
>
> Boaz.
Forgot to mention, DO NOT pass a "ram=..." parameter with more ram than you
actually have ! it can be critical if you have only one kernel. It'll cause as
far as I've seen, the kernel stucks at boot time (even before init comes up,
leaving you with a useless system). If you have more kernels, you can always
choose any of those and update lilo (or whatever bootloader you use), and then
reboot to your favorite kernel.
boaz.
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