slow (s-l-o-w) install

[Frank Cox]

On Sat, 16 Feb 2008 10:43:37 +0000
Alan Cox <alan at lxorguk.ukuu.org.uk> wrote:

> > Now I'm trying to install F8/x86_64 on it, and the installer is running
> > amazingly slowly.  It took about ten minutes before the initial graphical
> 
> Probably wrong memory caching in the BIOS. That's a common cause of those
> symptoms. If so boot with mem=2G or be patient and once you've got it
> installed take a look at /proc/mtrr and that will show which memory the
> system marked as cached. If its wrong then you can tweak the settings
> and/or beat up the BIOS vendor


You have definitely hit the nail on the head.

Booting with mem=2G makes this computer perform like it should.

This is an Intel DG33FB motherboard and I downloaded the latest bios, version
0372 dated January 29.  Unfortunately, that didn't solve the problem.  Booting
"normally" runs at the snail's pace that I previously mentioned.

Booting with mem=2G works fine, as I said.

The contents of /proc/mtrr when this machine is booted with mem=2G are as
follows:

reg00: base=0x00000000 (   0MB), size=2048MB: write-back, count=1
reg01: base=0x80000000 (2048MB), size=1024MB: write-back, count=1
reg02: base=0xc0000000 (3072MB), size= 256MB: write-back, count=1
reg03: base=0xcf800000 (3320MB), size=   8MB: uncachable, count=1
reg04: base=0xcf400000 (3316MB), size=   4MB: uncachable, count=1
reg05: base=0x100000000 (4096MB), size= 512MB: write-back, count=1
reg06: base=0x120000000 (4608MB), size= 128MB: write-back, count=1
reg07: base=0xd0000000 (3328MB), size= 256MB: write-combining, count=1

I looked in the bios setup and didn't see anything that obviously appeared to
be a method for telling the machine how to handle memory caching.  On the other
hand, I have no idea what I'm looking for so that setting may be staring me
right in the face and I'm not recognizing it.

So.... what should my next step be?


-- 
MELVILLE THEATRE ~ Melville Sask ~ http://www.melvilletheatre.com