4 GB RAM showing up as 3, BIOS memory hole and all that

Martin Cracauer cracauer at cons.org
Mon Aug 15 22:38:52 GMT 2005


Steve Kargl wrote on Mon, Aug 15, 2005 at 10:22:50AM -0700: 
> On Mon, Aug 15, 2005 at 12:56:57PM -0400, Martin Cracauer wrote:
> > 
> > I have a Dual Opteron board with 4x 1 GB RAM.  The memory count in the
> > BIOS goes up to 640 KB + 3072 MB, and FreeBSD says it sees 3 GB.
> 
> (snip)
> 
> > Any way to get my GB back?
> 
> This should be a FAQ.  No, you can't get it back.
> David O'brien has explained this more than once in 
> the freebsd-amd64 list.  Unfortunately, I don't
> have a handy URL for you to read.  I suggest scanning
> the list for posts by David in the Feb to May timeframe. 

Sorry, I just read every message David posted to amd64@ since January
2004 and I have only seen a reference that it has been explained too
often :-) He also said that you only lose the space from 3.5-4 GB, not
the full GB, and that the board can re-map that physical memory to > 4
GB.

http://groups-beta.google.com/group/fa.freebsd.stable/browse_frm/thread/9dc99b2be7f23d4/2d6de607055b020d?lnk=st&q=freebsd-amd64+david+%224+gb%22&rnum=7&hl=en#2d6de607055b020d

Any further hints what to look for? I am sure I did a decent scan of
the archive (both local and on google groups).

Martin
-- 
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
Martin Cracauer <cracauer at cons.org>   http://www.cons.org/cracauer/
 No warranty.    This email is probably produced by one of my cats 
 stepping on the keys. No, I don't have an infinite number of cats.


More information about the freebsd-amd64 mailing list