UnbrelOS only sees half of system RAM

Support and Troubleshooting
1

I’ve been messing with this for a few days now and can’t figure it out, and haven’t found any answers in the community. Using an older PC to set up UmbrelOS, and no matter what ram configuration I use, it only sees half of my RAM in the GUI.

PC has 4 RAM slots and all configurations show the actual number of RAM sticks in the BIOS, Any Idea what I could be doing wrong?

Examples If I put in

4 8GB sticks OS GUI shows 16GB

2 8GB sticks OS shows 8GB

4 4GB sticks OS shows 8GB

2 4GB sticks OD shows 4 GB

Currently have 4 8GB sticks installed

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image282×383 14.4 KB

2

Did you google it?

Google Search.

PC+has+4+RAM+slots+and+all+configurations+show+the+actual+number+of+RAM+sticks+in+the+BIOS%2C+Any+Idea+what+I+could+be+doing+wrong%3F

Examples+If+I+put+in

4+8GB+sticks+OS+GUI+shows+16GB

2+8GB+sticks+OS+shows+8GB

4+4GB+sticks+OS+shows+8GB

2+4GB+sticks+OD+shows+4+GB

Currently+have+4+8GB+sticks+installed&sca_esv=f517df8b24517ced&source=hp&ei=PHoXabjZJbPIkPIPguGUoA8&iflsig=AOw8s4IAAAAAaReITCg6ZWYcm0y_bMXwQLOodCNaXdFl&aep=22&udm=50&ved=0ahUKEwi4573np_KQAxUzJEQIHYIwBfQQteYPCAk&oq=&gs_lp=Egdnd3Mtd2l6IgBIAFAAWABwAHgAkAEAmAEAoAEAqgEAuAEByAEAmAIAoAIAmAMAkgcAoAcAsgcAuAcAwgcAyAcA&sclient=gws-wiz&sei=P3oXacH1D6GhkPIP6bLS0Q8&mstk=AUtExfAWoa-lVab8N3SekMYvrAU29r6ZnNjl_wjfqPLNgsAbLIP1IumHNJVhWBpKM6b2mEMnrJ0V4wY-z_qD9qVW840iGzownyzBpZg3UK1D7e_GzYDCfy3N_LjbGzqIj-3nSr2Z2-nmeUIWEONqT7OFaz_969uk5HF2ar1yDQ4-qW9ov2Mv86f-lgfK-4ZIcj2qXlhcinEJRq_G2GxqeDYFyxhFxBEH0Wl3lfalGDRML9n_I96mQdTp5cVd0Q&csuir=1

3

What’s Google? Yeah, I Googled it. The very first result is my post in the Umbrel Community, and all the others were for Windows-based machines. No results for Umbrel. Been building Windows-based PCs for 30 years. I tried all the usual things like switching Slots and sticks. All the Ram I tested reported fine in Windows systems, even on the same hardware. The Hardware I’m using was a Windows PC before I swapped drives to install Umbrel.

4

Umbrel UI may be reporting ram incorrectly.**

Verification: SSH into your Umbrel (Settings > Advanced > Terminal) and run the command free -h. This will show the true RAM usage of your system. If free -h shows the correct total, ignore the GUI.

5

So is the Swap File where the rest of my RAM is?

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6

No, Swap is Diskspace mapped to Memory space.

Are all of your memory sticks the same brand and speed?

In your BIOS … Ensure Enable Memory Hole Remapping setting is Enabled in your BIOS. This feature allows the OS to see RAM that might otherwise be “hardware reserved” for the motherboard or integrated graphics.

Any BIOS update available for your hardware? Maybe Google Search your hardware model to see if it has problems with certain memory types.

Other than that … I don’t have any other suggestions.

7

Thanks for the help, Latest Bios, and all sticks are the same brand/speed from the same kit. And Memory Hole Remapping is enabled. I guess I’ll run it as is until it becomes an issue, if it ever does, and look at new hardware.

I also pulled the CPU, no damaged pins.

1 Like
8

yes, because they don’t set a swap file and the new Linux kernel will automatically initiate ram based swap in absence of a swap file or partition.

on the system side:

sudo systemctl stop zramswap.service
sudo systemctl disable zramswap.service
sudo systemctl mask zramswap.service

Then set up a swap file in /data directory your problem should go away. This adds one 1.5 times the memory which I recommend:

result=$(echo "$(free -m | awk '/^Mem:/ {print $2}') * 1.5" | bc)
sudo dd if=/dev/zero of=/data/swapfile bs=1M count=$result
sudo chmod 600 /data/swapfile
sudo mkswap /data/swapfile
sudo echo "/data/swapfile swap swap defaults 0 0" >> /etc/fstab
1 Like