OS2 World Community Forum

OS/2, eCS & ArcaOS - Technical => Setup & Installation => Topic started by: roberto on July 17, 2020, 05:22:40 pm

Title: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: roberto on July 17, 2020, 05:22:40 pm

Keep these two values in the config.sys fixed without changing them:

SET JAVA_HIGH_MEMORY=1       rem in the end of the config.sys
VIRTUALADDRESSLIMIT=2048     rem remplace value


Then modify this line until it is adjusted to optimal performance:

SWAPPATH=C:\OS2\SYSTEM 2048 1228800  rem this is my value 1228800

Start with 409600 adding blocks of 409600, i.e. 819200 , 1228800

If at any time the system stops booting, then ALT + F1 then F2 tedit config.sys esc and correct the number , save and restart.


In my case I have gone from some values at startup
With the old config.sys
[C:\]mem /v

Total physical memory:      8 142 MB
Accessible to system:       3 054 MB
Additional (PAE) memory:    5 088 MB

Resident memory:              124 MB
Available virtual memory:   2 880 MB

Available process memory:
  Private low memory:         376 MB
  Private high memory:      1 344 MB
  Shared low memory:          322 MB
  Shared high memory:       1 323 MB



to these


[C:\]mem /v

Total physical memory:      8 142 MB
Accessible to system:       3 054 MB
Additional (PAE) memory:    5 088 MB

Resident memory:              124 MB
Available virtual memory:   4 078 MB      ******!!!!*****

Available process memory:
  Private low memory:         387 MB
  Private high memory:      1 344 MB
  Shared low memory:          333 MB
  Shared high memory:       1 323 MB

After open a lot of programs:

[C:\]mem /v

Total physical memory:      8 142 MB
Accessible to system:       3 054 MB
Additional (PAE) memory:    5 088 MB

Resident memory:              148 MB
Available virtual memory:   2 817 MB

Available process memory:
  Private low memory:         100 MB
  Private high memory:      1 344 MB
  Shared low memory:            0 MB       see this ZERO!! NO PROBLEM NO CRASH
  Shared high memory:         461 MB


With the difference that everything flows better and works better.

I hope it works for you.
This ARCAOS is the best system in the world.
I am happy.

For Andy:
The web-site you were commenting on ate the memory, I put it with another one from yahoo that also did the same,
 and the one you were commenting on ended with a 404 hahahaha, Our memory is no longer eaten.
 Thanks Andy.
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: Matt Walsh on July 17, 2020, 06:07:36 pm
Any idea how this interacts with a large RAM disk, and since you can't use the RAM disk in your swap path, would a smaller RAM disk work better with larger swap file?
Matt W.
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: Doug Bissett on July 17, 2020, 08:37:20 pm
Quote
SET JAVA_HIGH_MEMORY=1       rem in the end of the config.sys

From what I can find, this is only for JAVA 1.x (1.8 specifically). Position in CONFIG.SYS should make no difference.

Quote
SWAPPATH=C:\OS2\SYSTEM 2048 1228800  rem this is my value 1228800

All that does, for me, is make a 1200 MB swap file. You will probably find that swapping is never (or very rarely) used when you have more than 2 GB of real memory, anyway. Even on my old IBM ThinkPad T43, with 1.5 GB of real memory, I never see it actually use the swap space, although it can be forced, if I try hard enough.

Which version of OS/2 are you using? Which version of mem.exe (use bldlevel)?

I think that what you are seeing is a number wrap. I am using ArcaOS 5.0.5, and I can't reproduce what you show, but I didn't spend much time with it.

Quote
Any idea how this interacts with a large RAM disk, and since you can't use the RAM disk in your swap path, would a smaller RAM disk work better with larger swap file?

It may depend on which RAMDISK you use. I have the Arca Noae RAMDISK, as drive R:, using all memory above what OS/2 can normally use (about 4992 MB in this case), and HPFS format. I can set the SWAPPER to use the RAMDISK (SWAPPATH=R:\ 2048 2048), and it would probably work, if I limit my available memory to something small enough to force it to swap. The trick is, that the RAMDISK must be either HPFS, or JFS. There is support in the drivers for swapping. The path also needs to exist, when the swapper file is created (it is created new, at each boot), which means you must use the root of the RAMDISK, because there seems to be no way to create paths on the RAMDISK, before the swapper file is created. If you use a RAMDISK that uses normal memory, you would be better off to use that memory as real memory, so swapping is not required, and you won't run out of room.
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: roberto on July 17, 2020, 11:16:04 pm
Matt Walsh
I understand that a Ramdisk is something else.
 I have a 4100mb ramdisk as drive g:
 When trying to fill it with data everything has been blocked. Reboot the system.
I have formatted it as jfs and I have put 256mb of reserved low memory and without problems.
I have filled the 4.1gb ramdisk with 4gb of files without any problem.
I'm also not sure I understand your question.

Doug Bissett
Not only is it a swap issue, with small amounts of memory, no improvements are seen,
 but it still works like the engine of a Ferrari.
  You don't need to see it to know that it sounds perfect.
  This system is a ver504 upgraded to 505 from Arcaos.
[D:\BBB]bldlevel c:\sys\bin\mem.exe
Build Level Display Facility Version 6.12.675 Sep 25 2001
(C) Copyright IBM Corporation 1993-2001
Signature:       @#Alexander Taylor:1.1#@##1## 6 Jan 2019  15:04:11     reinforc
e::::::@@MEM.EXE - report physical memory
Vendor:          Alexander Taylor
Revision:        1.01
Date/Time:       6 Jan 2019  15:04:11
Build Machine:   reinforce
File Version:    1.1
Description:     MEM.EXE - report physical memory
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: ivan on July 18, 2020, 11:04:09 am
Hi roberto,

What exactly are you trying to do?

With SWAPPATH all you are doing is starting with a very large swap file.  The following information is taken from the config sys database.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SWAPPATH

=drive,path,mmm(in kb),nnn (in kb)
 
 
Parameter:
 
mmm is a number from 512 to 32767 which specifies how large the SWAPPER.DAT file can grow before it stops consuming hard disk space. The size is stated in the negative. In other words, if you have the mmm set to 512, then the SWAPPER.DAT file can grow until there is only 512k left on your hard disk.
 
nnn is the starting size of the SWAPPER.DAT file.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Maybe you should be looking at the MEMMAN option in your config sys.  Again from the database.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MEMMAN

=value
 
OS/2 can run more programs and use more data than can actually be stored in memory at any given time. This is done by swapping large amounts of memory to your hard disk and then reading the data back into memory when needed. This is called virtual memory. For example, if you have 4MB of memory you will see lots of disk activity while you are working with your system. A lot of this is OS/2 swapping memory to and from your hard disk. Lots of memory swapping slows down your system and can cause your hard disk to fragment quicker than normal.
 
Values:
 
The MEMMAN command controls the swap process. The syntax is MEMMAN=s,m,PROTECT,COMMIT where s=SWAP or NOSWAP; m=MOVE or NOMOVE.
The default is to have virtual memory on. To turn off virtual memory, which is NOT recommended, the config.sys file line should read: MEMMAN=NOSWAP. See <<=CAUTION=>> below.
 
PROTECT allows the allocation and use of protected memory for certain DLLs. This is done to protect those DLLs from being trashed by an errant program. Unless you are a programmer who needs this set to NOPROTECT, leave the default.
 
COMMIT. OS/2 will allocate space in the swap file whenever a program commits memory, i.e., a page in the swap file is allocated for every page of memory committed by a program, even if the data never actually gets swapped out. Your system should be more stable, but it will be slower also, since your swap file will grown when it doesn't have to. If you use this parameter, increase the size of your SWAPPER.DAT file by the amount of memory you are likely to use when using the COMMIT parameter. Most people "in-the-know" suggest that COMMIT not be used unless it is required by 16-bit OS/2 application

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

As a side note, be VERY careful if you try using NOSWAP it may make your system unbootable.




Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: roberto on July 18, 2020, 01:21:44 pm
Hi roberto,
Parameter:
 
mmm is a number from 512 to 32767 which specifies how large the SWAPPER.DAT file can grow before it stops consuming hard disk space. The size is stated in the negative. In other words, if you have the mmm set to 512, then the SWAPPER.DAT file can grow until there is only 512k left on your hard disk.
 
nnn is the starting size of the SWAPPER.DAT file.
Can you explain this:
[C:\os2\system]dir swapper.dat

The volume label in drive C is ARCAOS.
The Volume Serial Number is C78D:15C3.
Directory of C:\os2\system

18/07/20  9:16    1.258.291 K      0 ----  SWAPPER.DAT
        1 file(s) 1.258.291 K bytes used
                   12.948.082 K bytes free

Maybe the manual is old?

PD. By removing ramdisk, it improves performance. The hard disk I am using is an sdd.
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: ivan on July 18, 2020, 04:53:43 pm
Nothing strange about that.  Your swap file is 1,258,291K in size and was last written to at 9:16 on 18/07/20 which is about normal and there are 0 EAs attached.  It also says the reserved space for the file is 12,984,082K.
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: Pete on July 18, 2020, 06:43:25 pm
Hi All

Surely the "12.948.082 K bytes free" is the remaining free disk space not reserved space for swapper.dat


Regards

Pete
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: ivan on July 18, 2020, 09:54:08 pm
Opps!!  I thought I copied the correct figure from the calculator but it appears I didn't.  The reserved space for the file is 12,946,034K  (12,948,082 - 2048.  That is the amount of free space on the disk partition minus the amount that is left free).
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: roberto on July 18, 2020, 11:46:04 pm
I just got this error out in FM / 2 ver 3.24, attached photo. Is this from netlabs? or I don't know who to send the file to.
Pete and Ivan,
but have you tried it, my setup suggestion?
Pete is a **dir** comand, error? in copy paste?



Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: David Graser on July 19, 2020, 12:35:06 am
I just got this error out in FM / 2 ver 3.24, attached photo. Is this from netlabs? or I don't know who to send the file to.
Pete and Ivan,
but have you tried it, my setup suggestion?
Pete is a **dir** comand, error? in copy paste?

Post here. 

http://trac.netlabs.org/fm2/wiki
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: ivan on July 19, 2020, 02:27:41 am
Hi roberto,

You still haven't said what you are trying to achieve with these settings.  It would also help if you described the computer you are using them on (mboard, CPU, memory etc.).

My swapper.dat file hovers around 2 Mb regardless of what I do.

Since all my java programs are started from program objects I don't have java mentioned in my config.sys.
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: Andi B. on July 19, 2020, 11:29:42 am
May I remind people about the simple utility above512watch.cmd or memmon.cmd or whatever it is called for -
Code: [Select]
{0}[p:\util\above512] type above512watch.cmd
/* memmon.cmd - memory monitor */
/* a wrapper for above512 to monitor memory usage */
/* use control+c to stop monitoring */
/* pm = private memory */
/* sm = shared memory */
/* left entries display memory below 512 */
/* right entries display memory above 512 */

out = 0
curline = ""
first_string = ""

call rxFuncAdd "SysLoadFuncs", "REXXUTIL", "SysLoadFuncs"
call SysLoadFuncs


SIGNAL ON HALT /* termine program with CONTROL+C */

"mode 60,75"

do forever

'@ABOVE512 2>nul | rxqueue 2>NUL 1>&2'
call SysSleep 1

do while queued() <> 0
curLine = lineIN( "QUEUE:" )

if out = 0 then do
parse var curLine first_string .
if first_string = "current" then out = 1
else out = 0
end
else do
parse var curline val.1 . val.2 . . . val.3 . val.4 .
say "pm:" val.1 "sm:" val.2 " <---512---> pm:" val.3 "sm:" val.4

out = 0
end

end
end

exit

HALT:
exit

I think it came with the above512 package but not sure anymore. With this little script it's easy to monitor memory usage without knowing the details of Theseus. I have it running all the time. So I get a feeling about memory consumption of different applications. And I see when memory runs out before it makes my system unstable.

Sample output here while some apps are running -
Code: [Select]
pm: 253056 sm: 156544  <---512---> pm: 1835008 sm: 1542520
pm: 253056 sm: 156544  <---512---> pm: 1835008 sm: 1542520
pm: 253056 sm: 156544  <---512---> pm: 1835008 sm: 1542520

Of course such tools doesn't tell you exact values and you have to keep in mind that memory utilization is much more complex than a simple tool can show you. But as said it's very helpful to get a feeling.

Btw. I don't think reporting an out of memory problem is very helpful. Most of the time this is a problem of this specific system and specific setup and specific use case. Most of the time it's not a fault of a single application. And a lot of applications do not even report such failures but crashes silently or behave in unexpected ways. It's nice that FM/2 gives you the hint that there is something wrong on your system and it can't work as designed. But I'm pretty sure it's not FM/2s fault.
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: roberto on July 19, 2020, 11:34:28 am
You still haven't said what you are trying to achieve with these settings.  It would also help if you described the computer you are using them on (mboard, CPU, memory etc.).
This is what I want to do, that until now I didn't
OS/2 can run more programs and use more data than can actually be stored in memory at any given time. This is done by swapping large amounts of memory to your hard disk and then reading the data back into memory when needed. This is called virtual memory.
Quote
My swapper.dat file hovers around 2 Mb regardless of what I do.
You have put the first two lines of the config-sys as is, and have increased the number in the swappath?

Quote
Since all my java programs are started from program objects I don't have java mentioned in my config.sys.
Neither do I
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: roberto on July 19, 2020, 01:41:30 pm
I think it came with the above512 package but not sure anymore. With this little script it's easy to monitor memory usage without knowing the details of Theseus. I have it running all the time. So I get a feeling about memory consumption of different applications. And I see when memory runs out before it makes my system unstable.

Sample output here while some apps are running -
Code: [Select]
pm: 253056 sm: 156544  <---512---> pm: 1835008 sm: 1542520
pm: 253056 sm: 156544  <---512---> pm: 1835008 sm: 1542520
pm: 253056 sm: 156544  <---512---> pm: 1835008 sm: 1542520
This program seems silly to me, look what it shows me:
Code: [Select]
pm: 343680 sm: 265600  <---512---> pm: line, sm: /
pm: 343680 sm: 265600  <---512---> pm: line, sm: /
pm: 343680 sm: 265600  <---512---> pm: line, sm: /
pm: 343680 sm: 265600  <---512---> pm: line, sm: /
And EVERYTHING WORKS INCREDIBLY WELL for me. Except as always little nonsense, like the Seamonkey closes without asking you if you want to close open sales.
You commented days ago that this Atlassian application, I think I remember, ate the memory, after leaving the page open on the computer, leaving home and returning 1 or 2 hours, it appeared like this (attached photo). I had not lost memory, it remained.But their website failed.

For me the important thing is that others can replicate what I see.

Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: Andi B. on July 19, 2020, 02:50:06 pm
I can't believe that you don't have any upper memory so I zipped my working version and attach it here. Maybe you want to test.
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: roberto on July 19, 2020, 03:34:42 pm
I can't believe that you don't have any upper memory so I zipped my working version and attach it here. Maybe you want to test.
Well this is something else:
Code: [Select]
pm: 337152 sm: 259008  <---512---> pm: 1376256 sm: 1018316
pm: 337152 sm: 259008  <---512---> pm: 1376256 sm: 1018316
pm: 337152 sm: 259008  <---512---> pm: 1376256 sm: 1018316
pm: 337152 sm: 259008  <---512---> pm: 1376256 sm: 1018316
Saludos
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: roberto on July 19, 2020, 03:42:21 pm
Post here. 

http://trac.netlabs.org/fm2/wiki
Thanks, David
The problem now is that I think I create a second user in netlabs, and now I can't connect to netlabs
saludos
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: roberto on July 19, 2020, 04:18:21 pm
Andi see this, with your program:
Code: [Select]
pm: 181888 sm: 103744  <---512---> pm: 1376256 sm: 937208
pm: 181376 sm: 103232  <---512---> pm: 1376256 sm: 937208
pm: 181376 sm: 103232  <---512---> pm: 1376256 sm: 937208
pm: 181376 sm: 103232  <---512---> pm: 1376256 sm: 937208
pm: 174208 sm: 96064  <---512---> pm: 1376256 sm: 937208
pm: 174208 sm: 96064  <---512---> pm: 1376256 sm: 937208
pm: 174208 sm: 96064  <---512---> pm: 1376256 sm: 937208
pm: 174208 sm: 96064  <---512---> pm: 1376256 sm: 937208
pm: 181056 sm: 102912  <---512---> pm: 1376256 sm: 937208
pm: 181056 sm: 102912  <---512---> pm: 1376256 sm: 937208
pm: 181056 sm: 102912  <---512---> pm: 1376256 sm: 937208
pm: 181056 sm: 102912  <---512---> pm: 1376256 sm: 937208
pm: 181056 sm: 102912  <---512---> pm: 1376256 sm: 937208
After opening a lot of programs, (attached the taskbar), memory decreases to a point, where it begins to increase. I am sure I can open another bunch of programs without problems. It reminds me of OS / 2 from many years ago.

Especially for the most restless ones like Pete, Ivan, Doug, David, it occurs to me that between config-sys changes, make restarts. Starting by
SET JAVA_HIGH_MEMORY=1 and restart the system
VIRTUALADDRESSLIMIT=2048 and restart the system
SWAPPATH=C:\OS2\SYSTEM 2048 409600 and restart the system
In these things I am very careful, but ... I have not changed anything else.

saludos
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: roberto on July 19, 2020, 04:24:37 pm
After opening all those applications it shows me a lot of free memory. And the system is light.
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: roberto on July 19, 2020, 05:18:10 pm
Finally, try to open twice as many applications, and the system does not close, it continues to work. Some apps don't know what's going on, and others show these out of memory messages.
It seems to me that there is a lot of work here, so that the applications recognize the memory.
Finally I had to restart, because the applications are lost, and they do not know what is happening, but not because the system fails.
The system is a rock.
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: Andi B. on July 19, 2020, 07:29:59 pm
As usual - it seems you run out of lower shared memory. 12800 is small for different tasks.
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: ivan on July 19, 2020, 08:06:13 pm
roberto. are you trying to set some world record for concurrent running OS/2 programs?  Can you even use them all at once? 

I have a number of programs I use on a daily basis (6 of them) sitting on my desktop, others that I use are up on the Warpcenter and clicking on one of them usually starts it in about a second.  Programs that I am not using get closed, I seldom have problems and the main system has been up for the last 5 weeks running 24/7 (it was only shut down because I added an hard disk caddy and another 2 TB hard disk for storage).

It would help us to see what you are doing if you told us about the equipment you are trying this on (MB, CPU, Memory, HDs etc.) because not all systems handle memory the same way especially if they have some strange video system.
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: roberto on July 19, 2020, 08:56:42 pm
It seems to me that before it failed due to lack of memory, because I was trying to open the applications with drive-- double click - open folder - double click etc. But if I open programs with Larsen Comander it shows me this:
Code: [Select]
pm: 105472 sm: 2368  <---512---> pm: 1320384 sm: 424580
pm: 105472 sm: 2368  <---512---> pm: 1320384 sm: 424580
pm: 105472 sm: 2368  <---512---> pm: 1320384 sm: 424580
pm: 105472 sm: 2368  <---512---> pm: 1320384 sm: 424580
pm: 105472 sm: 2368  <---512---> pm: 1320384 sm: 424580

and I don't know what to open, nor does it decrease below 2368
Believe it impresses me.

Ivan - That is a HP8760W 8gb ssd, the pci is in the web martin.
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: roberto on July 19, 2020, 10:55:43 pm
Look at the PID number of the top.exe, 23000, there are about 40 to 50 programs running. With sm: 0
And taking a photo, with the pmview.
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: Pete on July 28, 2020, 02:15:02 am
Hi roberto

Thought I would try your settings on my ArcaOS 5.0.5 installation which seems to have memory problems not present with either the 5.0.1 or 5.0.4 installations on the same system.

I was already using VIRTUALADDRESSLIMIT=2048 and do not have java1.1 or 1.3 installed so did not add the SET JAVA_HIGH_MEMORY=1 line.

All I changed in fact was SWAPPATH=L:\OS2\SYSTEM 2048 2048 to SWAPPATH=C:\OS2\SYSTEM 2048 409600

This has made a huge difference to ArcaOS 5.0.5 as I can now use the system all day without running into the memory problems previously experienced with OpenOffice. Thanks for the tip  :-)

The question is: Why should increasing the size of the swap file resolve the memory issues?

I doubt the swap file gets used as ArcaOS "sees" the following installed RAM and I tend to only have 1 "major" app (openoffice , seamonkey) open at a time:-

[L:\SYS\BIN]mem /v

Total physical memory:      4,067 MB
Accessible to system:       3,315 MB
Additional (PAE) memory:      751 MB

Resident memory:              139 MB
Available virtual memory:     389 MB

Available process memory:
  Private low memory:         279 MB
  Private high memory:      1,189 MB
  Shared low memory:          215 MB
  Shared high memory:         868 MB


Another question is: Why does this memory problem affect 5.0.5 but not 5.0.1 or 5.0.4 installations on the same hardware? - Has something changed (for the worse) in memory management in 5.0.5?


Regards

Pete


Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: Lars on July 28, 2020, 02:31:19 pm
I have experienced the same (with 16 GB of installed memory !) and I would think that is an error in OS/2's memory management. I am using eCS, therefore I don't think this has anything to do with ArcaOS in particular.

I wouldn't be surprised if the memory manager checked IF some allocated memory could go into the swap file (after possibly increasing the swap file) even without actually doing so.
The MEMMAN directive has a COMMIT parameter that unconditionally allocates SWAP space (even if swapping would not be necessary) which kind of brings me to this conclusion. Maybe OS/2 expects some minimum of swap space to exist (even if unused) or some such. Or, with the invention of high memory, there was some bug introduced that improperly handles swapping under certain conditions.

It would not be the only error in OS/2's memory management. Think about high shared memory not getting freed when a DLL (using high shared memory) gets unloaded.
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: roberto on July 29, 2020, 06:45:34 pm
 Pete
 SET JAVA_HIGH_MEMORY=1
It seems that you are right and that it is better without a java set ... The funny thing is that when I looked at it with this
 line it was approximately 100mb more. Not now. I have removed it and the memory remains, I do not understand it,
  but if it is so better.
  In your case it seems that the swapp shows little memory, try reducing it from 409600 to 20480 or another smaller number.
   You should find a suitable number to have swapp and increase the virtual memory. I think, but what works best for you
    will undoubtedly be the best.


Lars
Your comment that there may be an error in how to manage the OS / 2 memory, but after what I have seen of the operation
 it seems to me that it is perfect. It is not that some or many applications do not know how to manage memory correctly.

 You talk about problems in high memory, although the same problems but worse are with low memory.
  Before when I went to the memory lowers to zero the system would break, not now.
  The other day I was struck with low memory, which could not reduce it from a number 2368,
  no matter how many applications it opened. But by closing them all, and opening them again then I go down to zero.
  For me the failure is in the applications. 2368 is the right thing.
  Something similar can happen in high memory.   ** When programs are closed the memory fail**.
  I'm glad it works for you. But you can tell us what number you have in the swapp and how much virtual memory the mem / v
   shows you
saludos
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: roberto on July 30, 2020, 03:07:07 pm
Pete
 SET JAVA_HIGH_MEMORY=1
I had to put it back, because it lost the stability of the system.
saludos
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: Pete on July 31, 2020, 01:45:01 pm
Hi All

My 5.0.1, 5.0.4 and 5.0.5 installations did not seem to need the JAVA setting as they were working well.

However, I needed to change the motherboard as it had developed a memory controller fault: all installed OS's - including Windows7 - could only see and access 50% of the installed RAM ie in my previous message I posted the output of mem /v but this was with 4 x 2GB sticks of RAM installed and recognised by motherboard BIOS. I also tried memtest which could only test 50% of installed RAM.

Having changed the motherboard( from Gigabyte 990FXA-UD3 to Asus M5A99X EVO R2.0 - no driver changes involved, very similar motherboards) and with 4 x 2 GB sticks of RAM installed mem /v now shows

[L:\SYS\BIN]mem /v

Total physical memory:      8,128 MB
Accessible to system:       3,536 MB
Additional (PAE) memory:    4,591 MB

Resident memory:              161 MB
Available virtual memory:     628 MB

Available process memory:
  Private low memory:         303 MB
  Private high memory:      1,344 MB
  Shared low memory:          242 MB
  Shared high memory:       1,109 MB

[L:\SYS\BIN]


Sadly that has actually made things worse as I now cannot run Openoffice at all, just get a message that module(s) cannot be loaded. Using the Quickstart results in the same (or very similar) message "Critical error: DosLoadModule failed" with a DLL name, eg fwk.dll, when the Desktop loads.

There had been *no* software changes involved in the motherboard swap.

I have tried adjusting the value of SWAPPATH without any change in the ability to run Openoffice. Adding the JAVA setting does not help.

Other software does not seem to have the problem(s) that Openoffice has.

I may just remove 2 of the RAM sticks to see what happens...


Regards

Pete
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: Dave Yeo on July 31, 2020, 04:12:45 pm
Hi Pete, you should try increasing your VIRTUALADDDRESSLIMIT.
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: ivan on July 31, 2020, 04:14:54 pm
Hi Pete,

I would suggest running Memtest from a bootable CD to check that your memory sticks are OK.

From my experience with various motherboards, changing the MB and using the same hard disk doesn't cause problems - the very odd time there was a problem Memtest found a memory module with dud sectors, changed the memory stick and all was well again.
Title: Re: How to have quantity and quality of memory
Post by: Pete on August 01, 2020, 01:57:46 am
Hi All

Removing 2 sticks of RAM leaving 2 x 2Gb sticks in place made no difference. Strange that a motherboard swap should introduce problems especially as they are very similar specification motherboards.

Reinstalled the 2 sticks of RAM and continued experimenting with SWAPPATH and VIRTUALADDDRESSLIMITvalues.

I seem to have found the settings that work for this system:-

   SWAPPATH=L:\OS2\SYSTEM 2048 204800
   VIRTUALADDRESSLIMIT=1536

Both the above settings are lower than used previously and, so far, everything seems to work - have opened and closed both Seamonkey and Openoffice3 times prior to posting this whereas previous settings would not let Openoffice run at all. I have also used Dosbox twice to run some dos games and Free Sudoku (java game) in between checking if Seamonkey or Openoffice fail to run.

No doubt immediately I post this message the whole lot will "crash and burn"  ;-)


Regards

Pete