Maximum bootable kernel size in current ARM linux
Nicolas Pitre
nico at fluxnic.net
Tue Sep 14 13:32:47 EDT 2010
On Mon, 13 Sep 2010, Bruce M. Penrod wrote:
>
>
> Russell King - ARM Linux wrote:
> > On Mon, Sep 13, 2010 at 12:40:56AM -0700, Bruce M. Penrod wrote:
> > > This seems like a pretty straightforward question, but extensive web
> > > searching hasn't shown a really clear, up-to-date answer. The most
> > > recent info is circa 2004 and states that 4MB is the largest uncompressed
> > > ARM kernel that may be loaded. Not being an ARM assembly guru (head.S
> > > baffles me), I'd like to know if that is still true in 2010, and if it
> > > is, why?
> >
> > It is no longer true; the only limit now is the size of contiguous RAM
> > to fit the kernel image into.
> >
>
> Interesting. I finally was able to get an uncompressed kernel a little below
> 4MB, and now it boots. I'm working with 2.6.35rc6 on an OpenRD Ultimate
> (Marvell Kirkwood) with Slackware, doing native compiles. I'm wondering if
> there could be any problem with U-Boot for larger kernels than 4MB, but it
> doesn't complain and says that it is copying the image. The symptom I had
> with a much larger kernel (~15MB) is a total hang, not even "Uncompressing
> linux".
>
> I'll add some innocuous stuff back in until I get above 4MB again and see if
> it breaks again.
When it breaks, do you still see the "Uncompressing Linux... done,
booting the kernel." message?
Nicolas
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