does Mint 4.0 fully use 8GB of Ram?

[guest]

Dear All,

I would like to install Mint 4.0 on a machine with Core2Duo or Quadcore Intel P35 chipset and 8 GB Ram.
This machine should be used to run several virtual machines via Vmware Server.

Does anyone know if Linux Mint 4.0 will be able to use fully the 8GB of Ram?

Thanks.

Cheers,

Sara

[Husse]

Well most motherboards won't even be able to use 8GB
Mint is 32 bit which means a theoretical maximum of 4 GB of which maybe ½ a GB is reserved for hardware memory addresses
(Some "exotic" memory "enhancers" unaccounted for)

[BlahBlah_X]

Why not use the ubuntu 64-bit edition? This will utilize all of your RAM.

[Fred]

Sara,

Upper memory support in the 32 bit 2.6 kernel has 3 options in the kernel config of either disabled, >4gb, or >64gb. This is a compile time option. I can't answer your question as far as what it is compiled for. You take a minor performance hit as you compile for a higher memory limit.

Mint uses the standard Ubuntu kernel so you might find the answer on the Ubuntu wiki or in the documentation on the Gutsy release.

Hopefully, one of the developers of Mint in the know will see this and tell you here. I would like to know myself. Or maybe Husse can find out for us.

By the way, My daughter's name is Sara, but spelled with an h. Good name.

Fred

Edit: Actually, BlahBlah_X's suggestion is not a bad idea. If your main purpose is to run the virtual machines, you would probably wind up with a faster system using a 64 bit host. VMware Server will run on a 64 bit host and serve both 32 bit and 64 bit guest operating systems.

[sara]

dear All,

thanks for your replies ... here are my comments to your suggestions/remarks

x Husse: ... all newer mboards support to up to 8GB ... for example look at P35 Neo2 from MSI

http://global.msi.com.tw/index.php?func ... at2_no=170


x BlahBlah_X: ... I have thought about installing Ubuntu 64-bit edition but I am new at Linux so am afraid to encounter errors that will take forever to be solved ... also, I have decided to finally move to Linux because of the beauty of Mint !!! and so far there is no 64-bit version of Mint ((


x Fred: ... do you mean that I should recompile Mint with the option for >4gb? ... if the answer is yes, then I would not see it as an option for me ... as I said, I am completely new to Linux and would like to install Mint because it seems to simple to use compared to other Linux distro ... (greetings to Sarah !!!) ...


Basically, my question would be ... if I install Mint (without recompile it) on a desktop with 8gb of Ram, what will happen?
Will Mint see only 4 gb of Ram and ignore the other 4gb?


Would it be possible to install Ubuntu 64bit version and then transform it in Mint?

has anyone tried to recompile Mint?

Thanks in advance to everyone for helping me with this !!!

Sara

[Fred]

Sara,

What I meant by my comments about compiling was that those were options that were available at the time the Ubuntu/Mint kernel was compiled. I don't know if the Mint 4/Ubuntu 7.10 kernel was compiled with the >4 gig option or not. Hopefully someone else in the forum that knows will see this and give us an answer. You could of course get the sources and recompile it yourself but no, I wasn't recommending that.

If it is not compiled for > than 4 gig it will not see or use more than 4 gig.

It is not practical to take Ubuntu 64bit and make Mint out of it.

Since Mint 4 and Ubuntu 7.10 share the same kernel, I am sure the kernel has been re compiled many times, though I haven't done it myself.

I will give Sarah your best!

Fred

[Chi]

Hi

From what I understand of 32bit OS's (of which LinuxMint is one) there is the theoritical 4GB limit Husse speaks of, so whilst a motherboard may physically support or hold 8GB the OS may not be able to use it.

So I think that recompiling a 32bit kernel will not use all 8GB. Will 8GB be required? If so then 64bit is the way to go.

Transforming 64bit to LinuxMint, whilst probably not impossible may not be straight forward. So I suppose at this stage decision is function over usability/beauty of LinuxMint.

[Fred]

Chi,

You might want to take a look at this article.

http://kerneltrap.org/node/2450

Good luck with the kids. Boy am I glad I am past those days!

Fred

[Chi]

Hi Fred

Seems I'm getting a little behind the times . Mind you never even seen a non server with 8GB.

[Fred]

Chi,

Yes, I wish I could afford to have her problem. lol Linux is not windows. You don't think Linus is going to let a little thing like the 32 bit address limit put a crimp in his get-a-long do you?

Actually, the kernel can only address 1 Gig less 128 Meg at one time without paging. But this limit was gotten around in the 2.0 days if memory serves. Don't quote me on that. Age, memory thing you know.

Time for bed for me. I need my beauty rest more than most. lol

Fred

[Husse]

Well as i said you can't get more than 4 GB (of which 1 GB, not ½ GB, is reserved for the system) in a 32 bit system. This is an unbreakable theoretical limit. But as so often with such limits there is a way round it. I wrote (Some "exotic" memory "enhancers" unaccounted for) such as PAE which makes use of a "fake 36 bit" memory bus to give a total of 64 GB, but each application can only use a virtual address space of 4 GB with 1 GB reserved as you can't address more than 4 GB with 32 bits
This linux.com article
http://www.linux.com/feature/119287
from sept 2007 states that "Few distros, if any, enable 64GB by default."
It was "impossible" to find anything about the Gutsy/Daryna kernel and this limit

[Fred]

Husse,

Thanks for trying. I couldn't find anything definitive either. I would be surprised if >4 gig was supported in the standard kernel. I guess she would either have to find a special purpose Ubuntu kernel or compile it herself.

I wish I could afford to have that problem. Too much ram. lol

Oh well.

Fred

[Husse]

Too much ram

yupp - got 2 GB most is never used....

[jdhore]

I use 8GB of RAM so lemme see if i can explain this. By default, the Ubuntu kernel from the repos only has support for 4GB and it will ignore all the rest of your RAM. If you use a x64-based distro (Mint does not have a x64 version, but Ubuntu does), then it will fully support all your RAM. Your other option is to recompile the kernel and set that memory setting they were talking about earlier, there's one small problem (i actually like this "problem") with it, however: 1 Process can not use more than 4GB...It will take advantage of all your RAM, just as i said, 1 application/process can not use more than 4GB.

[Fred]

jdhore,

Thanks for the "explanation" but I think thats what we just said above.

Tell us where we can find a kernel meta package with the Ubuntu patches that has the >4 Gig. compile time option compiled in, from a reputable repository.

Thanks,

Fred

[jdhore]

jdhore,

Thanks for the "explanation" but I think thats what we just said above.

Tell us where we can find a kernel meta package with the Ubuntu patches that has the >4 Gig. compile time option compiled in, from a reputable repository.

Thanks,

Fred

The simple answer to the question is that you can't *cough*Ubuntu Sucks*cough*...You COULD use the 2.6.22 kernel from Debian Testing which has a version with >4GB support (they call it -bigmem), but that would require a bit of work...

[Sunny Rabbiera]

jdhore,

Thanks for the "explanation" but I think thats what we just said above.

Tell us where we can find a kernel meta package with the Ubuntu patches that has the >4 Gig. compile time option compiled in, from a reputable repository.

Thanks,

Fred

The simple answer to the question is that you can't *cough*Ubuntu Sucks*cough*...You COULD use the 2.6.22 kernel from Debian Testing which has a version with >4GB support (they call it -bigmem), but that would require a bit of work...

yeh but mint is based on ubuntu so your argument against it is invalid...

[none]

I tried 64 bit Ubuntu, but found that too many programs did not have 64 bit versions, so I went back to 32 bit. I have 4G ram, 3.2 is recognized for use... but the memory is not expensive and I want 2 symmetrical channels so that's why I put it in. When more apps have 64 bit versions, I'll go to a 64 bit system.