Re: Alpha XL Support

Jay Estabrook - Alpha Migration Tools - LINUX Project (jestabro@brillig.amt.tay1.dec.com)
Mon, 25 Mar 96 11:04:55 -0500

> ...
> > This MILO and kernel *will* work on a true XL, as opposed to an AVANTI.
> ...
> > IMPORTANT LIMITATION: don't run with more than 64 Mb of physical memory!!!
> >
> > This *may* be removed in the future, or upped to 96 Mb, but for now and that
> > MILO/kernel, don't run with more than 64 Mb installed.
>
> May I ask why is this limitation ? I have 128 MB, and was
> wondering, why it crashed back to MILO right away...
> (now pulling DRAM out..)
>
> /Matti Aarnio <mea@utu.fi>

Matti, and all,

There are (or will be, later today), a newer MILO and kernel for true XL's
on gatekeeper.dec.com, in pub/DEC/Linux-Alpha/X11, as:

milo-1.3.76.xl /* MILO */
xl-1.3.77.gz /* kernel */

These should be used instead of the earlier ones based on 1.3.75. They raise
the memory limitation to 96MB. This limitation is strictly in support of
floppy use (actually, generic ISA bus DMA access to main memory); if you can
live without floppy, you could run a stock AVANTI kernel (with an XL-related
keyboard patch), and put in as much memory as you can afford... :-)

Note that you *can* use "set MEMORY_SIZE 96" to MILO, with more than 96MB
installed, and it will work appropriately. I've successfully built kernels
with 80MB in my XL-233, and it used them all... :-)

I'll examine this limitation in detail in following mail, and request some
input from the net at large for possible work-around schemes.

Thanks in advance.

--Jay++

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
American Non Sequitur Society: we don't make sense, but we do like pizza...

Jay A Estabrook Alpha Migration Tools
Mailstop: TAY1-2 (DTN) 227-4202
Digital Equipment Corp. (external) (508) 952-4202
151 Taylor Street enet: jestabro@amt.tay1.dec.com
Littleton, MA 01460-1407 decnet: tallis::jestabro
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------