Recommendations...

[Jerry Feldman]

I am curious to see if the BIOS supports virtualization.

On 06/15/2010 02:29 PM, Gerry Hull wrote:
> This is why I LOVE this list -- lots of great feedback.
>
> I'll go w/64-bit (trying it w/the live-CD first), and probably Virtualbox.
>
> BTW, I bought the X61 for $250, in mint condition, from Craigslist.
>  Pretty good deal for a decent dual-core box.
>
> Thanks!
>
> Gerry
>
> On Tue, Jun 15, 2010 at 2:08 PM, Jerry Feldman <gaf at blu.org
> <mailto:gaf at blu.org>> wrote:
>
>     On 06/15/2010 01:48 PM, Jon 'maddog' Hall wrote:
>     > It is true that a 32-bit machine can only access 4GB, and
>     sometimes even
>     > less than that (depending on how the application address space is
>     > organized) in one *virtual* address space, but this does not
>     necessarily
>     > stop the kernel from "using all of RAM".  It is just that
>     various parts
>     > of multiple virtual address spaces get mapped into the physical
>     memory
>     > of the machine.  It was this concept that allowed the old
>     PDP-11s, which
>     > had only a 64K memory address space (128K with separate
>     "instruction"
>     > and "data" address spaces) utilize all of the physical memory on
>     > machines that had multiple megabytes of RAM.
>     >
>     > So even a "32-bit" OS could fully utilize the real memory of a
>     64-bit
>     > CPU machine having multiple gigabytes of RAM if its memory
>     management
>     > software allows....it is just that the applications are limited to a
>     > 32-bit space at one time.
>     >
>     The Linux 32-bit kernel supports PAE (the extension that allows access
>     to more than 3GB RAM).  The other issue with 32-bit is with 32-but
>     applications as they are also limited in virtual space.  One of the
>     things I tested a few years ago was performance. Some applications and
>     benchmarks ran faster in 32-bit mode than in 64-bit mode, but some
>     will
>     run faster in 64-bit mode. My testing was on both 32-bit and 64-bit
>     Linux on X86/X86_64 as well as Linux on IA64. The X86_64
>     benchmarks beat
>     the IA64 in many cases.
>
>     Some technical advantages of a 64-bit kernel is that the X86_64 chips
>     use linear addressing in 64-bit mode where 32-bit is segmented. There
>     are some other chip related advantages that make a 64-bit Linux OS
>     perform better than the same OS in 32-bit mode. Graphics
>     performance is
>     also better in 64-bit mode.
>
>     --
>     Jerry Feldman <gaf at blu.org <mailto:gaf at blu.org>>
>     Boston Linux and Unix
>     PGP key id: 537C5846
>     PGP Key fingerprint: 3D1B 8377 A3C0 A5F2 ECBB  CA3B 4607 4319 537C
>     5846
>
>
>
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>
>


-- 
Jerry Feldman <gaf at blu.org>
Boston Linux and Unix
PGP key id: 537C5846
PGP Key fingerprint: 3D1B 8377 A3C0 A5F2 ECBB  CA3B 4607 4319 537C 5846


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