On Wed, 2008-10-01 at 18:26 -0400, Bill Davidsen wrote:
> c) I am running the 32 bit version of Linux. Would it make any
> difference to my RAM access if I ran the 64 bit version ?
>
Maybe, but that's the solution of last resort. If you have the x86_64
"live" CD
it's worth looking, but I think there are (at least) two better
solutions. First
is the PAE kernel. You don't need to go diddling your setup to try it,
just open
a terminal and run
yum install kernel-PAE
to get a PAE kernel. Then reboot, and when the boot menu comes up,
select the
PAE version. Run the free command and see if it found your memory.
The next step is to wait for the 2.6.27 kernel. WARNING: if you have
e1000
hardware, don't try this kernel until the issues have been resolved,
see the
kernel list, this kernel *may* make your e1000 into a brick by eating
the flash
firmware. It's being worked on, it's low probability, but wait as
week, good
people are trying it.
The reason 2.6.27 is desirable for you is that a lot of work has gone
into the
MTRR register mapping, and it *may* be able to describe your memory
where the
2.6.26 can't. Take that for what it's worth, I would try PAE now, and
wait until
2.6.27 is patched (unless you have a totally different hardware).
Great post. Thanks for all the advice. I will wait and see how 2.6.72
works.
LG