On Wed, 2012-12-05 at 12:19 +1100, Paul Szabo wrote: > Subject: linux-image-3.2.0-4-686-pae: Write couple of 1GB files for OOM crash > Package: src:linux > Version: 3.2.32-1 > Severity: normal > > > Writing a few large files, causes an OOM crash. > This happens on a fresh install from the > debian-wheezy-DI-b4-i386-netinst.iso > disk. I observed the problem on several dual-CPU Xeon servers: > Name CPU type RAM Comment > bivona 2*E5-2690 128GB normally runs amd64 kernel > como 2*E5-2690 64GB > briona 2*X5690 48GB > gemona 2*X5680 48GB > I have not noticed the problem with "desktop" machines with single > CPU chips and 4GB memory. [...] Although PAE supports up to 64 GB RAM, everything the kernel accesses must be mapped into 1 GB of virtual address space (about 880 MB of persistently mapped 'normal memory', plus temporary mappings of the remaining 'high memory'). The use of such a large amount of high memory is problematic, though I don't know whether it entirely explains this behaviour. (The memory stats don't seem to account for much of the normal memory, as there is ~40 MB free but the various classes of allocations seem to add up to only ~300 MB.) These machines should all be installed with the amd64 kernel. Is there any reason you would prefer not to do that? Perhaps the kernel flavour selection in the installer should be changed to favour that based on the RAM size, though I'm not sure what the critical value should be. Ben. -- Ben Hutchings Computers are not intelligent. They only think they are.
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