Mailing List Archive

On 4/26/21 8:56 PM, thelma@sys-concept.com wrote:
> My new PC has two 8GB sticks so total 16GB RAM
> but cat /proc/meminfo
> MemTotal: 14230648 kB
>
> Shouldn't it show 15GB+ ?
>
The kernel takes up some RAM, although I wouldn't expect 2GB worth. You
can check that with `dmesg | grep Memory:`.

The other possibility is that your RAM manufacturer used "gigabyte" to
mean 10^9 instead of 2^30, meaning that you actually have fewer than
16GiB. Hard disk manufacturers have been pulling this trick for years;
I'm not sure if it's common for RAM.

cal

thelma@sys-concept.com wrote:
> My new PC has two 8GB sticks so total 16GB RAM
> but cat /proc/meminfo
> MemTotal: 14230648 kB
>
> Shouldn't it show 15GB+ ?
>
>
>


I have 32Gbs here.  This is what it shows:


root@fireball / # cat /proc/meminfo
MemTotal:       32918508 kB


I would think it should show half that.  Odd for sure.  Run memtest or
some equivalent maybe?? 

Dale

:-)  :-) 

On 4/26/21 10:21 PM, Dale wrote:
> thelma@sys-concept.com wrote:
>> My new PC has two 8GB sticks so total 16GB RAM
>> but cat /proc/meminfo
>> MemTotal: 14230648 kB
>>
>> Shouldn't it show 15GB+ ?
>>
>>
>>
>
>
> I have 32Gbs here.  This is what it shows:
>
>
> root@fireball / # cat /proc/meminfo
> MemTotal:       32918508 kB
>
>
> I would think it should show half that.  Odd for sure.  Run memtest or
> some equivalent maybe?? 
>
> Dale

In my main system have similar output: cat /proc/meminfo
MemTotal: 32854284 kB

On 4/26/21 10:09 PM, cal wrote:
> On 4/26/21 8:56 PM, thelma@sys-concept.com wrote:
>> My new PC has two 8GB sticks so total 16GB RAM
>> but cat /proc/meminfo
>> MemTotal:       14230648 kB
>>   Shouldn't it show 15GB+ ?
>>
> The kernel takes up some RAM, although I wouldn't expect 2GB worth.  You can check that with `dmesg | grep Memory:`.
>
> The other possibility is that your RAM manufacturer used "gigabyte" to mean 10^9 instead of 2^30, meaning that you actually have fewer than 16GiB.  Hard disk manufacturers have been pulling this trick for years; I'm not sure if it's common for RAM.
>
> cal

Thanks for the input. I forgot to mention that this AMD is CPU +GPU, so is it possible that GPU take some RAM?

dmesg | grep Memory
[ 0.065475] Memory: 14159016K/14587784K available (16397K kernel code, 2527K rwdata, 3968K rodata, 1172K init, 1552K bss, 428508K reserved, 0K cma-reserved)
[ 1.553492] amdgpu 0000:09:00.0: amdgpu: Trusted Memory Zone (TMZ) feature disabled as experimental (default)

On 4/26/21 10:14 PM, thelma@sys-concept.com wrote:
> On 4/26/21 10:09 PM, cal wrote:
>> On 4/26/21 8:56 PM, thelma@sys-concept.com wrote:
>>> My new PC has two 8GB sticks so total 16GB RAM
>>> but cat /proc/meminfo
>>> MemTotal:       14230648 kB
>>>   Shouldn't it show 15GB+ ?
>>>
>> The kernel takes up some RAM, although I wouldn't expect 2GB worth.  You can check that with `dmesg | grep Memory:`.
>>
>> The other possibility is that your RAM manufacturer used "gigabyte" to mean 10^9 instead of 2^30, meaning that you actually have fewer than 16GiB.  Hard disk manufacturers have been pulling this trick for years; I'm not sure if it's common for RAM.
>>
>> cal
>
> Thanks for the input. I forgot to mention that this AMD is CPU +GPU, so is it possible that GPU take some RAM?
>
> dmesg | grep Memory
> [ 0.065475] Memory: 14159016K/14587784K available (16397K kernel code, 2527K rwdata, 3968K rodata, 1172K init, 1552K bss, 428508K reserved, 0K cma-reserved)
> [ 1.553492] amdgpu 0000:09:00.0: amdgpu: Trusted Memory Zone (TMZ) feature disabled as experimental (default)
>
>
By CPU+GPU, you mean the GPU is integrated into the CPU die? If so,
then yes, it is likely sharing system RAM. Elsewhere in dmesg probably
says how much. You can also probably find this in the BIOS somewhere.

cal

On 4/26/21 11:17 PM, cal wrote:
> On 4/26/21 10:14 PM, thelma@sys-concept.com wrote:
>> On 4/26/21 10:09 PM, cal wrote:
>>> On 4/26/21 8:56 PM, thelma@sys-concept.com wrote:
>>>> My new PC has two 8GB sticks so total 16GB RAM
>>>> but cat /proc/meminfo
>>>> MemTotal:       14230648 kB
>>>>   Shouldn't it show 15GB+ ?
>>>>
>>> The kernel takes up some RAM, although I wouldn't expect 2GB worth.  You can check that with `dmesg | grep Memory:`.
>>>
>>> The other possibility is that your RAM manufacturer used "gigabyte" to mean 10^9 instead of 2^30, meaning that you actually have fewer than 16GiB.  Hard disk manufacturers have been pulling this trick for years; I'm not sure if it's common for RAM.
>>>
>>> cal
>>
>> Thanks for the input. I forgot to mention that this AMD is CPU +GPU, so is it possible that GPU take some RAM?
>>
>> dmesg | grep Memory
>> [ 0.065475] Memory: 14159016K/14587784K available (16397K kernel code, 2527K rwdata, 3968K rodata, 1172K init, 1552K bss, 428508K reserved, 0K cma-reserved)
>> [ 1.553492] amdgpu 0000:09:00.0: amdgpu: Trusted Memory Zone (TMZ) feature disabled as experimental (default)
>>
>>
> By CPU+GPU, you mean the GPU is integrated into the CPU die? If so,
> then yes, it is likely sharing system RAM. Elsewhere in dmesg probably
> says how much. You can also probably find this in the BIOS somewhere.
>
> cal

Yes, that is the case. So that would explain missing RAM.