Installing and Managing HP-UX Virtual Partitions (includes A.03.03)

CPU, Memory, and IO Resources
Memory: Specifying Address Range (vPars A.04, A.03 and earlier)
Chapter 6
167
Memory: Specifying Address Range
(vPars A.04, A.03 and earlier)
Within the already allocated memory sizes, you can specify the memory address ranges using the
mem:::base:range syntax. However, this is not recommended unless you are familiar with using memory
addresses and for PA-RISC systems, you should also be familiar with the 2 GB memory requirement for the
HP-UX kernel and know the number of virtual partitions you will create.
For usage information, see the vparmodify (1M) manpage. You should select your base:range after
consulting vparstatus -A to determine which ranges are available.
NOTE
• Specifying an address range does not increase the amount of memory assigned to the
partition. Rather, it only specifies addresses to use for the already allocated memory sizes.
Therefore, all specified ranges cannot exceed the total allocated memory for the virtual
partition. In other words, the sum of the ILM- or CLM-specified ranges cannot exceed the
total amount of ILM or CLM memory reserved for the virtual partition.
• (vPars A.04) Address ranges are unique within a given virtual partition. Therefore,
specifying base:range (and not a cell_ID) is sufficient for using an address range within
CLM. You can use vparstatus -A to list the available ranges and whether the ranges are a
part of ILM or CLM. Further, if the range is within CLM, vparstatus -A also lists to
which cell the range belongs.
CAUTION Normally, ranges are granule-aligned (in other words, the starting address and the ending
address of the range is a multiple of a granule). However, due to memory fragmentation, some
of the ranges may not be granule-aligned. It is not recommended to assign such nongranule-
aligned ranges as user-specified ranges (mem:::base:range). Further, future vPars releases
may not support specifying ranges that are not aligned to a granule and may return an error
when such ranges are assigned to a virtual partition.
2 GB Restriction (PA-RISC only)
When ranges are specified for the entire memory owned by a partition, you should ensure that at least one of
the ranges is below 2 GB and is large enough to accommodate the kernel for that partition. However, other
partitions also require memory below 2 GB for their kernels. Hence, you also should ensure that the specified
range below 2 GB is not so large such as to preclude memory below 2 GB for the other partitions.
In general terms, the sum of the size of the kernels must be < 2 GB. To calculate the kernel sizes, see
“Calculating the Size of Kernels in Memory (PA-RISC only)” on page 241.
CAUTION Not allowing enough memory for the other partitions will cause the other partitions to not boot.
You can boot the partition by freeing up enough memory for the partition to boot, such as by
shutting down an active partition.
If no memory ranges are below 2 GBs for a given partition, the partition will not boot.