[lug] PEA Kernel

[Jonathan Corbet]

dio2002 at indra.com wrote:

> My newly installed centOS 5 system has exactly 4G RAM.  I installed 32 bit
> OS version.  But it is only recognizing 3.6G of ram (top , meminfo)
> 
> I've heard about the the so-called PAE kernel.  My system did NOT install
> it.  Do i still need this kernel just to see 4G?  I thought you didn't
> need it unless you were running MORE than 4G.

Remember that you lose part of the address space to the ISA hole, PCI
memory, etc.  You don't get the whole 4G for memory.  So, yes, you need
a PAE-enabled kernel to address all of your memory.

jon