Re: More than 64MB of memory

[Shawn Mattingly <smattin@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

It's not dependent on motherboard per se, but architecture of processor
and chipset.  A Pentium II is only physically capable of caching  512Mb of
RAM (in L1 cache), a Pentium Pro can do 1024Mb.  Limits also exist for a
normal Pentium, 486 and whatnot, but I don't have 'em handy.  After you
have determined how much the processor can handle, you must worry about
how the chipset on the motherboard implements processor caching if you
desire to add gonzo amounts of RAM.  Tom's hardware page (
http://www.tomshardware.com/ ) has several very good discussions on the
topic accompanied by info and independent reviews of specific motherboards
if you are interested.

A note with the append=128M command...use with care.  If you put the wrong
amount into the append statement your system will crash in a spectacular
manner, and start to do really strange things as you start filling memory
up (I tried it once and nuked a file system).

Shawn

Shawn

Bruce Smith wrote:

> Hello all,
>
> There was some talk at yesterday's meeting about adding more than 64MB
> of memory in a PC and if some operating systems could recognize it.
> I have 128MB of memory in my work PC so I just did some testing.
>
> First I tested Windows 95 and Windows NT 4.0, and they both see all
> 128MB of memory just fine.
>
> In Linux, the following line is required in /etc/lilo.conf to see any
> memory above 64MB:  (it's documented in the BootPrompt-HOWTO)
>
>     append="mem=128M"
>
> (change "128" to the actual amount of memory installed)
>
> One other thing to keep in mind, is some motherboards may not cache
> memory above 64MB, so installing more than 64MB may actually slow
> down some applications.  This will vary from mobo to mobo.  See the
> specs on your motherboard determine this.
>
> --------------------------------------------
> Bruce Smith                bruce@armintl.com
> System Administrator / Network Administrator
> Armstrong International, Inc.
> Three Rivers, Michigan  49093  USA
> --------------------------------------------