Arch Linux

cra

Member

From: Sweden

Registered: 2009-09-25

Posts: 70

kernel panic after installing additional ram

Hi there.
(I think this should go here, not in laptop issues because it seems to be more hardware-related)

I have a laptop Acer Aspire 2920Z with 2x512 Mb stock ram and I recently bought an memory upgrade 2x2gb. Any of them works when inserted separately, but when I install both, I see kernel panic upon starting X on my i686 Arch installation (and /proc/meminfo shows that I have only 3Gb).
The same behaviour occurs when I try to boot from latest Arch install iso or x86_64 archbang livecd.
My BIOS is updated to latest version and it shows that I have 4Gb of RAM installed.

Right now I installed x86_64 linux kernel but I still have kernel_panic on booting my machine.

Is there any chance that I can use 4gb ram on my laptop?

Also, what are the ways to save those error messages that kernel panic provides? (aside from just taking a picture of the screen with my camera)

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Thou shalt not make a machine in the likeness of a human mind

cfr

Member

From: Cymru

Registered: 2011-11-27

Posts: 7,140

Re: kernel panic after installing additional ram

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Ar … _64-bit.3F

Is your machine able to use the 64 bit kernel?

When you say you installed that kernel, how did you do that exactly? Presumably that won't work unless you switch over to a 64 bit system generally (with multi-arch stuff to support the odd 32 bit programme where necessary)?

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cra

Member

From: Sweden

Registered: 2009-09-25

Posts: 70

Re: kernel panic after installing additional ram

Hi! Thanks for fast reply

My machine is now using 64bit kernel and I have the necessary flag in /proc/cpuinfo, yes.

I installed kernel by changing architecture param in pacman.conf, running pacman -Syy and pacman -S linux, as described in the corresponding page on the wiki, but without reinstalling every single package I have

So now uname -m gives me "x86_64", but I still can't use all 4 Gb :(

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Thou shalt not make a machine in the likeness of a human mind

chris_l

Member

Registered: 2010-12-01

Posts: 390

Re: kernel panic after installing additional ram

I installed kernel by changing architecture param in pacman.conf, running pacman -Syy and pacman -S linux, as described in the corresponding page on the wiki, but without reinstalling every single package I have

Do that step.

EDIT:

Any of them works when inserted separately, but when I install both, I see kernel panic upon starting X on my i686 Arch installation (and /proc/meminfo shows that I have only 3Gb).
The same behaviour occurs when I try to boot from latest Arch install iso or x86_64 archbang livecd.

Wait, you mean just booting the livecd gets you a kernel panic? Insert both of them at the same time, and the test them with memtest86+

Chances are your motherboard pins could have a problem. A problem that is noticiable when you insert both sticks.

Test them with memtest86+.

Last edited by chris_l (2012-12-10 16:22:24)

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"open source is about choice"
No.
Open source is about opening the source code complying with this conditions, period. The ability to choose among several packages is just a nice side effect.