Bug 124312

Summary: Memory Detection - Install kernal boot failure
Product: [Fedora] Fedora Reporter: Steve Stephens <s.stephens>
Component: kernelAssignee: Arjan van de Ven <arjanv>
Status: CLOSED WONTFIX QA Contact:
Severity: medium Docs Contact:
Priority: medium    
Version: 2CC: s.stephens
Target Milestone: ---   
Target Release: ---   
Hardware: i386   
OS: Linux   
Whiteboard:
Fixed In Version: Doc Type: Bug Fix
Doc Text:
Story Points: ---
Clone Of: Environment:
Last Closed: 2004-06-17 12:34:05 UTC Type: ---
Regression: --- Mount Type: ---
Documentation: --- CRM:
Verified Versions: Category: ---
oVirt Team: --- RHEL 7.3 requirements from Atomic Host:
Cloudforms Team: --- Target Upstream Version:
Embargoed:

Description Steve Stephens 2004-05-25 16:08:25 UTC
From Bugzilla Helper:
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.0; en-US; rv:1.6)
Gecko/20040113

Description of problem:
Target system is Compaq Proliant 5000 w/ 512MB

System hangs after displaying on console:

Uncompressing Linux... Ok, booting the kernel.

Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable):
Fedora core 2 

How reproducible:
Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1.Boot from Fedora Core 2 CD 1
2.Reply "linux mem=exactmap mem=640k@0 mem=511m@1m" to boot: 
3.
    

Expected Results:  The installation kernel should boot.

Additional info:

Comment 1 Dave Jones 2004-05-26 11:29:01 UTC
I'm fairly sure I did an install on one of these during FC2 test,
using just mem=512M  does that work for you?


Comment 2 Steve Stephens 2004-05-27 17:53:43 UTC
"linux mem=512m" fails also. linux can't boot from device <null>.

Comment 3 Dave Jones 2004-05-27 18:08:56 UTC
ah, but it gets further than before right ?
This new error sounds like something else, like it isn't finding your
root device for some reason.


Comment 4 Steve Stephens 2004-05-27 19:30:01 UTC
The fact remains that the options that worked for FC1 do not work for
FD2: "linux mem=exactmap mem=640k@0 mem=511m@1m". Does the support org
have access to equipment to replicate? 

When I do not provide any options,the kernel does not detect enough
memory to continue. This is consistant between FC1 & FC2. I conclude
that there is not a hardware or media problem.

If I try again by specifying the the mem option ("linux
mem=512m"),3what is the "root" option? 



Comment 5 Steve Stephens 2004-05-27 19:57:41 UTC
I just tried mem=512m on FC1 with similar results. The Kernel cannot 
boot from the ramdisk.

Comment 6 Dave Jones 2004-05-27 20:22:02 UTC
it seems that this code got changed in 2.5 to reflect changes in 2.4,
and then got backed out and replaced with memmap= for the above
functionality.  2.4 never changed accordingly.
I'm trying to sort this mess out upstream right now on the
linux-kernel mailing list.


Comment 7 Steve Stephens 2004-05-27 20:46:19 UTC
Glad I could be helpfull.

Comment 8 Dave Jones 2004-06-17 12:34:05 UTC
upstream opinion is that things aren't going to change.
so, for 2.6 kernels use memmap=, 2.4 use mem=

exactmap now belongs to the memmap argument.