Mainpage
Searchform
History
Versions
Categories
Contents
Deutsch
Kernel: Versions since 2.2.0
You have a system with a processor compatible to the i386 family of processors and 1 GByte or more physical memory (RAM) installed. Of course you want to use as much RAM as possible under Linux.
The Linux kernel for i386 processors currently supports by default up to
almost 1 GByte physical memory in one system. If the system has more
memory, the Linux kernel must be forced to use only the lower 960 MByte
of this memory by passing the parameter mem=960M
to the
kernel at boot time.
Support for up to almost 2 GByte of RAM can be achieved by applying a kernel patch. This kernel patch will however reduce the usable virtual address space in user space for a single process from 3 GByte to 2 GByte. For Linux on processors of the i386 family this is currently (April 1999, Linux Version 2.2.5) the limit.
Of course the source tree of the Linux kernel must be installed in the
system. It can be found below e.g. /usr/src/linux-2.2.5.SuSE
,
once you have installed the package lx_suse
, that comes with
SuSE Linux 6.1 .
cd /usr/src/linux-2.2.5.SuSE patch -p1 </pfad/zur/patchdatei 2>outPlease also read the hints in the SDB article Applying kernel patches.
With this patch i386-Linux supports up to 1984 MByte RAM .
------------8<---- cut here ---------8<---------------- diff -ur linux-1GB/arch/i386/vmlinux.lds linux/arch/i386/vmlinux.lds --- linux-1GB/arch/i386/vmlinux.lds Mon Dec 28 07:45:13 1998 +++ linux/arch/i386/vmlinux.lds Wed May 26 13:35:49 1999 @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ ENTRY(_start) SECTIONS { - . = 0xC0000000 + 0x100000; + . = 0x80000000 + 0x100000; _text = .; /* Text and read-only data */ .text : { *(.text) diff -ur linux-1GB/include/asm-i386/page.h linux/include/asm-i386/page.h --- linux-1GB/include/asm-i386/page.h Tue Jan 26 22:04:02 1999 +++ linux/include/asm-i386/page.h Wed May 26 13:34:31 1999 @@ -79,7 +79,7 @@ * * which has the same constant encoded.. */ -#define __PAGE_OFFSET (0xC0000000) +#define __PAGE_OFFSET (0x80000000) #define PAGE_OFFSET ((unsigned long)__PAGE_OFFSET) #define __pa(x) ((unsigned long)(x)-PAGE_OFFSET) ------------8<---- cut here ---------8<----------------
Hint : For the kernels contained in SuSE Linux, that can be
installed with YaST, the configuration files can be found on CD1 below
/suse/images/config/config*.ikr
. If you want to use one of
these configuration files as a starting point for the new configuration ,
copy it to
/path/to/kernel-sources/.config (e.g. : /usr/src/linux-2.2.5.SuSE/.config)before you start the kernel configuration with one of the commands
make menuconfig
, make config
or
make xconfig
.
System administration/Kernel and bootconfiguration/LILO
configuration
.
If your system has more than 1984 MByte RAM (especially systems with 2GByte of memory), the Linux kernel must be forced to use only the first 1984 MByte RAM. If boot problems don't disappear then, restrict the memory even further, e.g. to 1960 MB.
mem=1984M
/etc/lilo.conf
manually,
the correct syntax is
append="mem=1984M"
See also:
Keywords: KERNEL, PATCH, 2GB, RAM
Categories:
Kernel
Mainpage
Searchform
History
Versions
Categories
Contents
Deutsch