Is there any way I can get access to the rest of my memory?

[Avi Greenbury]

Graham Watkins wrote:
> A bit of googling suggested that installing the PAE kernel would
> make more memory accessible.  This I have done but it hasn't made
> any difference.

What did you install, and have you rebooted since? Could you paste the
output of 

  uname -a

into an email so we can see which kernel you're running? Also, how are
you testing for the amount of memory available? And do you know which
processor you're running? PAE requires cooperation from the CPU, but
it's been a very long time since anybody made a CPU that didn't
cooperate properly.

> I know that I should get the full memory if I install the 64 bit
> version but, if I have understood correctly, this would use twice as
> much memory anyway, giving me equivalent to 2gb on a 32 bit system,
> so I don't really see the point.

You've understood incorrectly, fortunately :) A tiny proportion of
what is in RAM takes up twice as much space as what it would do
otherwise - results and current-states of CPU operations, basically -
but the huge majority of stuff is exactly the same size - all the
cached files and other assorted data. In reality there's such a
marginally small increase of memory usage that it may as well not be
there, especially if as part of the upgrade you get another GB of
memory.


-- 
Avi