Miguel Filipe posted <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, excerpted below, on Sat, 11 Jun 2005 16:02:33 +0100:
> I have a dual-opteron with 8GB of ramm installed (8x1GB dimms) on a Tyan > K8W (S2885). But linux only uses 7.3 Gb... Linux on boot detects > correctly the available 8Gb: > [snip] > Memory: 7391892k/8388608k available (2655k kernel code, 0k reserved, > 700k data, 200k init) > > Now, I've seen that this unused memory is related to pci && AGP dma > maps.. But, on my sparc I also have PCI and I don't have these problems > (4gb real, 4gb used..) And on dual-opterons with 8GB from HP (rack 1u, > don't recall model name) I also have 4Gb real, and 4Gb being used. > > So, does anyone know how to make this system really use the 8GB of ram.. > > Having 700MB of fast ram being unusable isn't very to my taste... Same mobo here, but only a gig of memory at present (hopefully soon to be four, but not yet). So, I can't say for /sure/ that this works, but from what I've read, it should, and I know the options are there... Get the latest BIOS from the TYAN site and flash it in. I had trouble figuring out how to install it (no MSWormOS of any kind, left here), but there are FreeDOS floppy images out there that you can download. I got one of those, mounted it using the loopback and copied the BIOS loader and binary flash image file to it, then unmounted it and wrote it to floppy. That works perfect! Here's one site for FreeDOS Ripcord. Use the OEM Bootdisk linked a bit more than half way down the page. That's what I've used. http://fdos.org/bootdisks/ Once you have the latest BIOS, you get MANY more options that the earlier ones had, including memory tweaking options (which I really was able to use, as my memory just couldn't quite run stable at its rated 400MHz, PC3200, but it's absolutely stable at 387MHz, and I'm gradually tweaking up the individual settings to help make up for the lost speed, as I see they are stable), AND including two options YOU will find quite useful, having to do with the memory hole just under 4GB, and there's one other, I don't remember what it is, but IIRC from what I've read, it's fine in the default setting anyway. So, tweak that 4GB memory hole setting, turning the hole /on/, and it should then see and use /all/ the memory, according to the other posts I've seen. If this isn't descriptive enough, and nobody else mentions them, ask, and I'll reboot and get the specific items you need to worry about from my BIOS. -- Duncan - List replies preferred. No HTML msgs. "Every nonfree program has a lord, a master -- and if you use the program, he is your master." Richard Stallman in http://www.linuxdevcenter.com/pub/a/linux/2004/12/22/rms_interview.html -- [email protected] mailing list
