Re: sdram and linux
tony mollica wrote:
>
> Hi. Just looking for a little more info.
>
> Just installed 64megs 168 pin sdram (replacing the 64megs of the usual
> type 72 pin edo stuff) in my system and it appears
> to be causing file system corruption, as indicated on boot
> up by fsck (attempted boot up, actually). Booting from the rescue
> disk and running fsck reports lots of problems, fixes them all, but the
> problems reappear at the next reboot from the hard disk drive. Also ran
> into a problem with programs exiting unexpectedly and core dumping for
> no apparent reason.
What kind of motherboard?
Were the EDO dimms 5 Volt? Some motherboards will allow mixing or
switching,
but sometimes it is not so easy.
Most SDRAM is 3.3 Volt, unbuffered. Some might not be. Make sure...
Also, most SDRAM (especially PC100 stuff coming soon) has Serial
Presence Detect(SPD)
on it, so that when the POST code in BIOS is initializing hardware, it
can properly
configure memory timings and such based on the fact that SDRAM is
different than
EDO. It is possible to detect the difference between the two using old
memory
sizing techniques, but SPD is more accurate... if it is accurate!
If your BIOS is not recognizing the SDRAM as SDRAM for some reason, you
will not see
stable behavior at all.
> Has there been any similar reports or other problems using
> 168 pin sdram type memory or are there any hardware or kernel
> settings that I may have overlooked to make this work? The
> memory works ok on 'other' o.s.'s and machines.
Does the memory work okay in your machine with, say, DOS? I know, it
sucks,
but it is less demanding, so to speak. We have found in our testing at
work
that 16-bit and 32-bit "other OS's" from Redmond work okay most of the
time
with a particular memory config, but if you try to run the multitasking
version (the one with the "NT" in it), you see a lot of blue screen. We
Crash...
Anyway, I would say that you should check motherboard/chipset
requirements
(3.3 or 5 volts-- important distinction, probably unbuffered), check
that
the BIOS knows how to configure SDRAM, and make sure the stuff works in
some minimum config (like DOS). Simply booting and passing the BIOS
memory
test is not always enough.
Finally, if you plan on upgrading to a 100MHz motherboard some time in
the near
future, get GOOD SDRAM. PC100 is fairly challenging.
I have been spending a lot of time lately dealing with SDRAM on intel
motherboards,
so I got a little wordy. Hope it helps somebody...
-dh
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