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Hello, I just upgraded my RAM-memory from 2gb to 4gb on my 32bit system, but somehow free -m, htop and top only says that i have about 2.5gb, surely something must be wrong here?
I tried to google it and asked around a little bit and even tho 4gb is max on 32bits systems, i should be getting a lot more than 2.5gb. I've checked in bios and it seems like all the 4gb is being recognized there atleast.
Anyone have any toughts on what could be causing this? It kinda sucks doubling your RAM-memory but only getting about 500mb out of it.
Last edited by göteborg-johan (2009-04-29 20:43:42)
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you're probably at the ~3.2 GB limit that's imposed by being a 32 bit OS; then subtracting kernel and video memory (all depending on your system setup) could get you to that 2.5 number you're seeing.
that's just a guess though, someone else should chime in if more knowledgeable
//github/
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I agree with brisbin33. You could recompile kernel with added PAE support to use up to 4 GB (i suppose around 3.5 in your case).
Thinkpad T61p : T7700 | 4GB RAM | nVidia FX 570M | Intel 4965
Arch64 @ Openbox
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I agree with brisbin33. You could recompile kernel with added PAE support to use up to 4 GB (i suppose around 3.5 in your case).
Sounds like quite a project, but I'll look into it, thanks. I read somewhere that support for large memory was built in by default, but i guess that is not the case then?
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I would not bother (with kernel re-compiling): 32-bit arch kernel supports up to 4GB
There are other things to check. But make sure that your BIOS really sees 4GB of RAM
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Just checked, 100% sure bios sees all the 4 gb of RAM. What would the other things be to check?
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My mistake
it looks like Arch kernel (or rather vanilla kernel) does not enable PAE along HIGHMEM4GB. You need to set HIGHMEM64G to enable PAE. In turn this will allow kernel to use all memory (4GB).
I am not sure if this is bug in vanilla kernel (most likely) or special feature.
This requires kernel recompilation with setting HIGHMEM64GB
Now how much you will actually see depends on GART, BIOS options for memory remapping and so on. Really depends on your mobo.
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I guess it would be easier to just install 64-bits then, instead of modifying the config every time there is a kernel update. Is it so simple that you just keep the home partition the way it is, and then just reinstall all packages and it should work? Xorg settings HAL policies would probably be a good idea to backup too but that's basically it, right?
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Be sure your hardware supports a 64bit OS first.
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Be sure your hardware supports a 64bit OS first.
It's a Core2Duo E7300, it should be no problem.
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i also posted this when i went 32->64; posts 1 and 29 may be useful
Thanks
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