More than a TB of RAM

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October 22nd, 2004, 06:33 AM
gore

More than a TB of RAM

This is mainly just a big **** you too the people on IRC from AntiOnline who laughed at me and made fun of me when I said there was an OS that could in fact use 1 TB of RAM or more:

Quote:

What are the limits for memory?

The limit is 4 gigabytes on a standard i386™ install. Beginning with FreeBSD versions 4.9 and 5.1, more memory can be supported through pae(4). This does require a kernel recompile, with an extra option to enable PAE:

options PAE

FreeBSD/pc98 has a limit of 4 GB memory, and PAE can not be used with it. On FreeBSD/alpha, the limit on memory depends on the type of hardware in use - consult the Alpha Hardware Release Notes for details. Other architectures supported by FreeBSD have much higher theoretical limits on maximum memory (many terabytes).

I got laughed at for saying I saw something with a TB of RAM or something about using that much RAM, and I could not find the damned page where I saw it or which OS, so I of course got made fun of and called a moron and mocked. Well, here it is, straight from the Free BSD FAQ. I'll point out I did NOT say the OS or the machine HAD this much RAM, I simply said it COULD, and got laughed at, hearing "No OS on Earth could even address that much RAM you moron".

:kissass: :flip:
October 22nd, 2004, 11:31 AM
lepricaun

don't let them get to you, it is the same thing as when you walked into a store to buy a computer and had the option between a 120mb and 250 mb harddisk, when you would say "the 250mb please", they would say: "why bother, there is NO WAY anyone would ever use so MUCH space on his hdd!".
and look what we have now :p

just to say, the people who wrote that specific OS just thought ahead, cause i'm convinced that within 10 years we have many terabytes of RAM!!
October 22nd, 2004, 01:55 PM
cacosapo

Re: More than a TB of RAM

Quote:

I'll point out I did NOT say the OS or the machine HAD this much RAM, I simply said it COULD, and got laughed at, hearing "No OS on Earth could even address that much RAM you moron".

hummm, example:

Z/OS CAN address, both virtual AND real, storage with 64-bit addressing, and NOWADAYS you can use RAM with up to 16 exabytes and create a C++ programming using 16 exabytes of virtual storage. :)

Currently, computers that supports that O.S. are limited to 256 GB of RAM.

http://www-1.ibm.com/servers/eserver...f/gm130230.pdf
October 22nd, 2004, 03:12 PM
gore

Man, if I had a system with a TB of RAM, and like 16 Processors.... I'd soooo play a game of Pong! Heh, I could probably use up a few Gigs of RAM, but with current applications, a TB would be hard too fill with what I have. That's like editing an entire collection of DVDs like all at once while you're checking E-Mail, playing UT 2004 and have like 10 browsers open. I'd still want it though lol.

The IBM Blue Gene /L supposedly will start reaching this high of a rate, but it is going too do more than I do on a computer. And it runs Linux! ;) Thanks guys.
October 22nd, 2004, 03:27 PM
cacosapo

Quote:

The IBM Blue Gene /L supposedly will start reaching this high of a rate, but it is going too do more than I do on a computer. And it runs Linux! ;) Thanks guys. [/B]

not just "runs Linux", but runs 64-bits Linux versions :)
October 23rd, 2004, 03:05 PM
slarty

This is ludicrous - any 64-bit machine should be able to address way over 1TB of RAM.

So basically, a 1991 vintage DEC Alpha architecture would have theoretically been able to have 1TB RAM if the OS and hardware supported it.

Slarty
October 23rd, 2004, 03:15 PM
Danielsd

THEORETICALLY, everything is possible. In the next few years i'm sure it will happen.
October 23rd, 2004, 06:53 PM
Tim_axe

Well, there are of course limits in implementations. Such as the 4GB limit mentioned with 32bit processors. The processor simply cannot address more RAM than that.

When you consider Windows (32bit) and protected memory...an application can only address up to 2GB (31bits) of RAM. The other 2GB is restricted to Windows. Some versions of Windows has a 3GB switch where apps can use up to 3GB, but I don't have enough $$$ for 3GB of ECC & Registered RAM...

GNU/Linux has its own workarounds, but the 32bit processor won't handle more than 4GB of addressable RAM.

With 64bit, you have a heck of a lot more addressable memory. Which is only one reason why 64bit computing kicks butt. Along with requiring half of the clock time for some operations.

Anyways, memory limits are real things that quite a few people run into. Engineers run into it a lot when graphing some functions in detail and simulating things. You can also run into it when stitching panoramas. You can run into it by playing in PS for long enough. But I don't know much about editing DVD's, aside from working on different scenes at a time that aren't too long seperately. I haven't worked in Premier before, so I'm not sure how those programs use up RAM...

Anyways, over a TB of ram would be nice if I got it for free and won the lottery...
October 23rd, 2004, 07:07 PM
Danielsd

Quote:

[i]
Anyways, over a TB of ram would be nice if I got it for free and won the lottery... [/B]

I would also liketo win the lottery. But i have no chance cause i'm not playing :)
October 24th, 2004, 08:38 PM
chsh

Quote:

Originally posted here by Tim_axe
Well, there are of course limits in implementations. Such as the 4GB limit mentioned with 32bit processors. The processor simply cannot address more RAM than that.

When you consider Windows (32bit) and protected memory...an application can only address up to 2GB (31bits) of RAM. The other 2GB is restricted to Windows. Some versions of Windows has a 3GB switch where apps can use up to 3GB, but I don't have enough $$$ for 3GB of ECC & Registered RAM...

There are exceptions to this rule. Intel's Pentium line from the P3 on up is capable of addressing 39bits of RAM via PAE (Physical Address Extension).

Quote:

With 64bit, you have a heck of a lot more addressable memory. Which is only one reason why 64bit computing kicks butt. Along with requiring half of the clock time for some operations.

Don't forget, with the AMD-64 processors, you have double the registers as well, although it is not true 64bit addressability, it is only 48bit (darn).
October 25th, 2004, 04:55 AM
MilitantEidolon

I love when a thread starts out with a the link that says the post contains less than friendly language. :D

- MilitantEidolon
October 25th, 2004, 10:50 PM
RoadClosed

MS DOS broke it's boundaries. BILL did it, why wouldn't more complex systems and the slew of open source Gurus be able to do it, EVEN if physical addressing has limitations based on computing architecture. Besides you were just saying you read about it somewhere, hell I do that all the time. This will help; Go listen to WW3 track one, Make War on the IRC channel. :D

Oops just looked at dates; I am a week late, but hey next time throw in page files, and virutal memory addressing even on the Alpha the 32 bit architecture was bumped up to 43 bits using VMS. Tossing that aside the "physical" address of a 64 bit processor is WAY beyond a single terabyte even if Linux hasn't caught up. Then if you scale a system with multiple processors using AIX or something there is no way to tell the limitations of addressable memory. Suppose you build an 8-way S70??? And that's not virtualizing anything in the sense of overcoming a single processor limitation.

Hell to my knowledge specifications aren't even in order yet. Unix spec 2 doesn't define it and neither does the LP64 Data model.

Next time smack em and let them no in basics that 18 petabytes is conceivable. In Nuclear simulations Terabytes have been around for a while where ENTiRE databases are stored in memory alone. What server/channel?