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#1 2008-06-25 07:41:25

JeremyTheWicked
Member
From: Poland
Registered: 2008-05-23
Posts: 193

4GB RAM support?

Hi all.

Just a quick question: the 32 bit versions of Windows only support 3,2GB RAM. Is it the same with Linux? I'd like to buy a new laptop with 4GB RAM but I don't want to have to install Arch64 (I'm a lazy ass and don't like all the fuss with getting 32bit apps to work).


arch(3) adj amused because you think you understand something better than other people ;P

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#2 2008-06-25 07:47:07

Stythys
Member
From: SF Bay Area
Registered: 2008-05-18
Posts: 878
Website

Re: 4GB RAM support?

32-bit is 32-bit. Doesn't matter what OS you install, so yes, it won't support 4GB of RAM.


[home page] -- [code / configs]

"Once you go Arch, you must remain there for life or else Allan will track you down and break you."
-- Bregol

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#3 2008-06-25 08:30:44

kishd
Member
Registered: 2006-06-14
Posts: 401

Re: 4GB RAM support?

If you re-compile the kernel with PAE enabled. It will support 4g ram.

$ cat /proc/meminfo
MemTotal:      4074660 kB
MemFree:        191744 kB
Buffers:        122912 kB
Cached:        3164832 kB
SwapCached:        260 kB
Active:        1528520 kB
Inactive:      2187880 kB
HighTotal:     3210816 kB
HighFree:         6200 kB
LowTotal:       863844 kB
LowFree:        185544 kB
SwapTotal:     3269216 kB
SwapFree:      3268956 kB
Dirty:           42088 kB
Writeback:           0 kB
AnonPages:      415948 kB
Mapped:         656084 kB
Slab:           104616 kB
SReclaimable:    81184 kB
SUnreclaim:      23432 kB
PageTables:       7076 kB
NFS_Unstable:        0 kB
Bounce:            500 kB
CommitLimit:   5306544 kB
Committed_AS:  1451356 kB
VmallocTotal:   116728 kB
VmallocUsed:     48020 kB
VmallocChunk:    59892 kB

32 bit system

Last edited by kishd (2008-06-25 08:34:47)


---for there is nothing either good or bad, but only thinking makes it so....
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#4 2008-06-25 08:34:29

Stythys
Member
From: SF Bay Area
Registered: 2008-05-18
Posts: 878
Website

Re: 4GB RAM support?

PAE will decrease the performance of some apps, so unless he actually needs that much RAM, it's not worth it. Either use standard 32-bit, or go with arch64.


[home page] -- [code / configs]

"Once you go Arch, you must remain there for life or else Allan will track you down and break you."
-- Bregol

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#5 2008-06-25 09:10:10

zyghom
Member
From: Poland/currently Africa
Registered: 2006-05-11
Posts: 432
Website

Re: 4GB RAM support?

I had to recompile kernel, otherwise only 3 GB seen
actually I changed only:
CONFIG_HIGHMEM64G=y


Zygfryd Homonto

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#6 2008-06-25 09:44:24

JeremyTheWicked
Member
From: Poland
Registered: 2008-05-23
Posts: 193

Re: 4GB RAM support?

zyghom wrote:

I had to recompile kernel, otherwise only 3 GB seen
actually I changed only:
CONFIG_HIGHMEM64G=y

Is PAE something different then?

If I decide to go 64 is it better to choose an AMD processor? Or is CoreDuo better even then?

Also: does VirtualBox work well under 64? Will I be able to install a 32 bit OS under VB?


arch(3) adj amused because you think you understand something better than other people ;P

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#7 2008-06-25 10:57:47

moljac024
Member
From: Serbia
Registered: 2008-01-29
Posts: 2,676

Re: 4GB RAM support?

JeremyTheWicked wrote:
zyghom wrote:

I had to recompile kernel, otherwise only 3 GB seen
actually I changed only:
CONFIG_HIGHMEM64G=y

Is PAE something different then?

If I decide to go 64 is it better to choose an AMD processor? Or is CoreDuo better even then?

Also: does VirtualBox work well under 64? Will I be able to install a 32 bit OS under VB?

CoreDuo doesn't support 64bit computing, Core2Duo, however, does.
And yes, you should be able to install a 32bit guest OS in Virtualbox.

Last edited by moljac024 (2008-06-25 11:44:58)


The day Microsoft makes a product that doesn't suck, is the day they make a vacuum cleaner.
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#8 2008-06-25 11:25:14

JeremyTheWicked
Member
From: Poland
Registered: 2008-05-23
Posts: 193

Re: 4GB RAM support?

Thanks guys. I have a month yet to decide so I'll take it all into consideration.

@zyghom: If I recompile the kernel - is there any way to still get automatic updates? (I guess not, but just making sure)


arch(3) adj amused because you think you understand something better than other people ;P

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#9 2008-06-25 11:50:20

Stythys
Member
From: SF Bay Area
Registered: 2008-05-18
Posts: 878
Website

Re: 4GB RAM support?

how would you get automatic updates for a custom kernel?


[home page] -- [code / configs]

"Once you go Arch, you must remain there for life or else Allan will track you down and break you."
-- Bregol

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#10 2008-06-25 12:17:37

zyghom
Member
From: Poland/currently Africa
Registered: 2006-05-11
Posts: 432
Website

Re: 4GB RAM support?

JeremyTheWicked wrote:

Thanks guys. I have a month yet to decide so I'll take it all into consideration.

@zyghom: If I recompile the kernel - is there any way to still get automatic updates? (I guess not, but just making sure)

no, and few other things depend on it:
nvidia
truecrypt
virtualbox-modules

that is all from that what I use


Zygfryd Homonto

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#11 2008-06-25 12:24:45

Issh
Member
Registered: 2007-12-02
Posts: 58

Re: 4GB RAM support?

Stythys wrote:

how would you get automatic updates for a custom kernel?

pull from git, or use abs with a custom pkgbuild or so.

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#12 2008-06-25 15:13:29

JeremyTheWicked
Member
From: Poland
Registered: 2008-05-23
Posts: 193

Re: 4GB RAM support?

Issh wrote:
Stythys wrote:

how would you get automatic updates for a custom kernel?

pull from git, or use abs with a custom pkgbuild or so.

Exactly what I was thinking about... I plan on trying something like that.


arch(3) adj amused because you think you understand something better than other people ;P

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