Re: Can't allocate memory

[Rik van Riel <riel@humbolt.nl.linux.org>]

On Fri, 23 Jul 1999, Ruben wrote:

> 	Well, I use ALSA drivers for my soundcard (it allows me full
> duplex in my sb16). And now, when Linux eats all my memory with
> it's buffers and cache, I can't play sound because the /dev/dsp
> device says that it can't be allocated memory...

The problem is that the kernel needs 64k of physically contiguous
memory in the lower 16 MB of memory. With the OSS driver it's a
config option to just reserve that memory on bootup -- 64k is
nothing in a 64M system...

> 	I don't know much about Linux memory management, can anybody
> help me? It's a bit annoying the need of loading a pair of gimps
> each time Linux eats all my memory with cache...

Linux-mm-www team: I think we should make this an FAQ and
explain (in detail) how things work and what should be done
to overcome this limitation...

Rik -- Open Source: you deserve to be in control of your data.
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