[gentoo-user] BIOS says 2GB, MemTest86 says 2GB, top says 900MB

[gentoo-user] BIOS says 2GB, MemTest86 says 2GB, top says 900MB

[Mark Knecht]

One of my machines smoked last week so when tearing it apart for spare
parts I noticed the the PC2700 CL 2.5 memory is what my wife's machine
uses and she had only 512MB so I took the opportunity to throw in a
couple of DIMMs. When I boot Linux (and I'm writing this from Linux
running the new memory so the machine works) top reports only about
900MB while BIOS itself says 2GB. I fired up memtest86 and it reports
2GB. It's been running memory tests for a couple of hours now with no
problems so it seems like it should work.

Is there anything in the kernel config that would stop a 2.6.32-gentoo
kernel from seeing all the memory?

I have double checked that the memory does seem to be seated well in
the DIMM sockets.

The box is an old eMachines thing that has no support and so far I
can't find any BIOS updates.

How does memory get reported up to the kernel? Is that something in
the kernel (i.e. - choosing the proper chipset support or something)
or is it purely the return from some sort of BIOS call? If so can it
be tested or circumvented to get the machine to recognize everything
I've put in?

Thanks,
Mark


mark@dragonfly ~ $ cat /proc/meminfo
MemTotal:         904312 kB
MemFree:          569140 kB
Buffers:           12084 kB
Cached:           161656 kB
SwapCached:            0 kB
Active:           170828 kB
Inactive:         130708 kB
Active(anon):     130084 kB
Inactive(anon):        0 kB
Active(file):      40744 kB
Inactive(file):   130708 kB
Unevictable:           0 kB
Mlocked:               0 kB
SwapTotal:       1052216 kB
SwapFree:        1052216 kB
Dirty:                32 kB
Writeback:             0 kB
AnonPages:        127804 kB
Mapped:            46652 kB
Shmem:              2288 kB
Slab:              15444 kB
SReclaimable:       7140 kB
SUnreclaim:         8304 kB
KernelStack:        1328 kB
PageTables:         1484 kB
NFS_Unstable:          0 kB
Bounce:                0 kB
WritebackTmp:          0 kB
CommitLimit:     1504372 kB
Committed_AS:     416504 kB
VmallocTotal:     122880 kB
VmallocUsed:       44728 kB
VmallocChunk:      66616 kB
DirectMap4k:       15932 kB
DirectMap4M:      901120 kB
mark@dragonfly ~ $

[gentoo-user] Re: BIOS says 2GB, MemTest86 says 2GB, top says 900MB

[Mark Knecht]

On Mon, Jan 18, 2010 at 6:09 PM, Mark Knecht <markknecht@gmail.com> wrote:
> One of my machines smoked last week so when tearing it apart for spare
> parts I noticed the the PC2700 CL 2.5 memory is what my wife's machine
> uses and she had only 512MB so I took the opportunity to throw in a
> couple of DIMMs. When I boot Linux (and I'm writing this from Linux
> running the new memory so the machine works) top reports only about
> 900MB while BIOS itself says 2GB. I fired up memtest86 and it reports
> 2GB. It's been running memory tests for a couple of hours now with no
> problems so it seems like it should work.
>
> Is there anything in the kernel config that would stop a 2.6.32-gentoo
> kernel from seeing all the memory?
>
> I have double checked that the memory does seem to be seated well in
> the DIMM sockets.
>
> The box is an old eMachines thing that has no support and so far I
> can't find any BIOS updates.
>
> How does memory get reported up to the kernel? Is that something in
> the kernel (i.e. - choosing the proper chipset support or something)
> or is it purely the return from some sort of BIOS call? If so can it
> be tested or circumvented to get the machine to recognize everything
> I've put in?
>
> Thanks,
> Mark

A very simple test - booting from an old Gentoo install CD - shows 2GB
- so apparently it's a kernel config issue.

Sorry for the noise.

Cheers,
Mark

Re: [gentoo-user] Re: BIOS says 2GB, MemTest86 says 2GB, top says 900MB

[Iain Buchanan]

On Mon, 2010-01-18 at 19:08 -0800, Mark Knecht wrote:
> On Mon, Jan 18, 2010 at 6:09 PM, Mark Knecht <markknecht@gmail.com> wrote:

> > How does memory get reported up to the kernel? Is that something in
> > the kernel (i.e. - choosing the proper chipset support or something)
> > or is it purely the return from some sort of BIOS call? If so can it
> > be tested or circumvented to get the machine to recognize everything
> > I've put in?
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Mark
> 
> A very simple test - booting from an old Gentoo install CD - shows 2GB
> - so apparently it's a kernel config issue.

High Memory Support to be precise :)  In your case CONFIG_HIGHMEM4G=y
should do.

Processor Type And Features
=> High Memory Support
   => off / 4Gb / 64Gb

-- 
Iain Buchanan <iaindb at netspace dot net dot au>

Whenever people agree with me, I always think I must be wrong.
- Oscar Wilde

Re: [gentoo-user] Re: BIOS says 2GB, MemTest86 says 2GB, top says 900MB

[Mark Knecht]

On Mon, Jan 18, 2010 at 7:55 PM, Iain Buchanan <iaindb@netspace.net.au> wrote:
> On Mon, 2010-01-18 at 19:08 -0800, Mark Knecht wrote:
>> On Mon, Jan 18, 2010 at 6:09 PM, Mark Knecht <markknecht@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> > How does memory get reported up to the kernel? Is that something in
>> > the kernel (i.e. - choosing the proper chipset support or something)
>> > or is it purely the return from some sort of BIOS call? If so can it
>> > be tested or circumvented to get the machine to recognize everything
>> > I've put in?
>> >
>> > Thanks,
>> > Mark
>>
>> A very simple test - booting from an old Gentoo install CD - shows 2GB
>> - so apparently it's a kernel config issue.
>
> High Memory Support to be precise :)  In your case CONFIG_HIGHMEM4G=y
> should do.
>
> Processor Type And Features
> => High Memory Support
>   => off / 4Gb / 64Gb
>
> --
> Iain Buchanan <iaindb at netspace dot net dot au>

Hi Iain,
   That was already set unfortunately:

dragonfly linux # cat .config | grep CONFIG_HIGHMEM4G
CONFIG_HIGHMEM4G=y
dragonfly linux #

   Being that it's an Intel chipset here's the INTEL specific stuff:

dragonfly linux # cat .config | grep INTEL
CONFIG_X86_INTEL_USERCOPY=y
CONFIG_CPU_SUP_INTEL=y
CONFIG_X86_MCE_INTEL=y
CONFIG_MICROCODE_INTEL=y
# CONFIG_MOXA_INTELLIO is not set
CONFIG_HW_RANDOM_INTEL=y
CONFIG_AGP_INTEL=y
CONFIG_SND_HDA_INTEL=y
CONFIG_SND_HDA_CODEC_INTELHDMI=y
# CONFIG_SND_INTEL8X0 is not set
# CONFIG_SND_INTEL8X0M is not set
# CONFIG_INTEL_IOATDMA is not set
# CONFIG_INTEL_MENLOW is not set
# CONFIG_CRYPTO_CRC32C_INTEL is not set
dragonfly linux #

   I'm running up against one other thing. I haven't really worked on
this machine for awhile. Currently the disks are showing up as
/dev/hda and I thought with newer kernels they were supposed to be
/dev/sda. With my newest 2.6.32-gentoo-r1 it seems to be trying to be
/sda, but with 2.6.32-gentoo it's coming up /hda. Bottom line question
- can I dual list /dev/hda7 and /dev/sda7 in my fstab file so that
which ever one I boot at least it finds something?

   Still looking for the cause of this missing memory.

   Thanks!

From a California downpour tonight,
Mark

Re: [gentoo-user] Re: BIOS says 2GB, MemTest86 says 2GB, top says 900MB

[Iain Buchanan]

On Mon, 2010-01-18 at 20:30 -0800, Mark Knecht wrote:
> On Mon, Jan 18, 2010 at 7:55 PM, Iain Buchanan <iaindb@netspace.net.au> wrote:

> > High Memory Support to be precise :)  In your case CONFIG_HIGHMEM4G=y
> > should do.
> >
> > Processor Type And Features
> > => High Memory Support
> >   => off / 4Gb / 64Gb

> Hi Iain,
>    That was already set unfortunately:
> 
> dragonfly linux # cat .config | grep CONFIG_HIGHMEM4G
> CONFIG_HIGHMEM4G=y

and this is the kernel you're running?

> dragonfly linux #
> 
>    Being that it's an Intel chipset here's the INTEL specific stuff:

almost identical.  The differences shouldn't matter:
$ grep -i intel /usr/src/linux/.config   
CONFIG_X86_INTEL_USERCOPY=y
CONFIG_CPU_SUP_INTEL=y
CONFIG_X86_MCE_INTEL=y
CONFIG_MICROCODE_INTEL=y
CONFIG_HW_RANDOM_INTEL=y
# CONFIG_AGP_INTEL is not set
CONFIG_SND_HDA_INTEL=y
# CONFIG_SND_HDA_CODEC_INTELHDMI is not set
# CONFIG_SND_INTEL8X0 is not set
# CONFIG_SND_INTEL8X0M is not set
CONFIG_INTEL_IOATDMA=y
# CONFIG_INTEL_MENLOW is not set
# CONFIG_CRYPTO_CRC32C_INTEL is not set

also check "memory split", "Processor family" but I'm just guessing
now... 

>    I'm running up against one other thing. I haven't really worked on
> this machine for awhile. Currently the disks are showing up as
> /dev/hda and I thought with newer kernels they were supposed to be
> /dev/sda. With my newest 2.6.32-gentoo-r1 it seems to be trying to be
> /sda, but with 2.6.32-gentoo it's coming up /hda.

I didn't think there should be a difference between 2.6.32 and
2.6.32-r1..

>  Bottom line question
> - can I dual list /dev/hda7 and /dev/sda7 in my fstab file so that
> which ever one I boot at least it finds something?

I've never tried.  I just edited it by hand (make a backup) and stuck to
the new kernel!

sorry I'm not much help...
-- 
Iain Buchanan <iaindb at netspace dot net dot au>

Don't read everything you believe.

Re: [gentoo-user] Re: BIOS says 2GB, MemTest86 says 2GB, top says 900MB

[Stroller]

On 19 Jan 2010, at 04:30, Mark Knecht wrote:
> ... Currently the disks are showing up as
> /dev/hda and I thought with newer kernels they were supposed to be
> /dev/sda. With my newest 2.6.32-gentoo-r1 it seems to be trying to be
> /sda, but with 2.6.32-gentoo it's coming up /hda. Bottom line question
> - can I dual list /dev/hda7 and /dev/sda7 in my fstab file so that
> which ever one I boot at least it finds something?

Set labels on the filesystems. See Walt's post in the thread "sata  
disk assignment mismatch..." (16 January 2010 17:23:24 GMT).

Stroller.

Re: [gentoo-user] Re: BIOS says 2GB, MemTest86 says 2GB, top says 900MB

[Mark Knecht]

On Mon, Jan 18, 2010 at 10:36 PM, Stroller
<stroller@stellar.eclipse.co.uk> wrote:
>
> On 19 Jan 2010, at 04:30, Mark Knecht wrote:
>>
>> ... Currently the disks are showing up as
>> /dev/hda and I thought with newer kernels they were supposed to be
>> /dev/sda. With my newest 2.6.32-gentoo-r1 it seems to be trying to be
>> /sda, but with 2.6.32-gentoo it's coming up /hda. Bottom line question
>> - can I dual list /dev/hda7 and /dev/sda7 in my fstab file so that
>> which ever one I boot at least it finds something?
>
> Set labels on the filesystems. See Walt's post in the thread "sata disk
> assignment mismatch..." (16 January 2010 17:23:24 GMT).
>
> Stroller.

Yes - I ran across that idea in the Ubuntu forums last night.
(Actually Google pointed me to the Ubuntu forums. Disappointing it
didn't point me to Gentoo but I guess we're a much smaller crowd these
days.)

I'll give that a try later today.

cheers,
Mark