unable to install beta6 [amd64] on Dell 2850 with 4 GB RAM,workaround

[Peter Wemm]

On Tuesday 28 September 2004 06:34 am, Lawrence Farr wrote:
> Does the amd64 port have support for em64t then?

It is the same thing.  FreeBSD never used the undocumented AMD-specific 
IOMMU, nor 3dnow etc.  We don't do anything that assumes an integrated 
memory controller, nor hypertransport, etc.  Aside from one silly bug, 
even FreeBSD-5.2 will run on intel cpus.  And 5.2.1 will run on later 
intel cpus even without our bug being fixed.

There isn't anything to "support".  Since AMD wouldn't tell me any of 
the information about the things unique to the AMD cpus, we don't use 
any of them.  That's why we essentially run out of the box on the intel 
cpus.

Regarding the 4G of ram thing below..  Several people have tinkered with 
the auto-tuning of kernel resources based on physical ram.  On our 
kernel, we have a finite limit of kernel private VM and simple scaling 
based on physical ram will quickly fill it up.  I'm still not sure that 
its good enough.  I'm just kicking myself that I didn't get to try this 
on a machine with 32G of ram  that I dont have access to anymore.

> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: owner-freebsd-amd64 at freebsd.org
> > [mailto:owner-freebsd-amd64 at freebsd.org] On Behalf Of Claus
> > Guttesen Sent: 28 September 2004 14:28
> > To: freebsd-current at freebsd.org; freebsd-amd64 at freebsd.org
> > Subject: unable to install beta6 [amd64] on Dell 2850 with 4
> > GB RAM,workaround
> >
> > Apoligies for crossposting, but ...
> >
> > Was unable to install the amd64-port on a Dell 2850
> > with a Perc 4e/Di RAID-controller and dual Nocona at
> > 3.2 GHz. The server has 4 GB RAM. As a last resort I
> > removed 2 GB RAM, and I was (finally) able to install
> > FreeBSD.
> >
> > Applies to at least beta5 and -6.
> >
> > I was under the impression tha the amd64-port could
> > see the 4 GB RAM as a flat memory space, so it never
> > occured to me, than I had to remove 2 GB in order to
> > perform the installation.
> >
> > Putting the RAM back makes the server stop during boot
> > (after it detects the CD-drive).
> >
> > Claus
> >
> > _______________________________________________
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> > http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-amd64
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> > "freebsd-amd64-unsubscribe at freebsd.org"
>
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-- 
Peter Wemm - peter at wemm.org; peter at FreeBSD.org; peter at yahoo-inc.com
"All of this is for nothing if we don't go to the stars" - JMS/B5