RE: [PATCH v3 5/5] mm/slub: do not create dma-kmalloc if no managed pages in DMA zone

David Laight
2021-12-15T11:51:56Z

From: Vlastimil Babka
> Sent: 15 December 2021 10:34
>
> On 12/15/21 08:27, Christoph Hellwig wrote:
> > On Wed, Dec 15, 2021 at 07:03:35AM +0000, Hyeonggon Yoo wrote:
> >> I'm not sure that allocating from ZONE_DMA32 instead of ZONE_DMA
> >> for kdump kernel is nice way to solve this problem.
> >
> > What is the problem with zones in kdump kernels?
>
> My understanding is that kdump kernel can only use physical memory that it
> got reserved by the main kernel, and the main kernel will reserve some block
> of memory that doesn't include any pages from ZONE_DMA (first 16MB of
> physical memory or whatnot).
...

Is there still any support for any of the very old hardware that could only
support 24bit DMA?

I think the AMD PCnet-ISA and PCnet-PCI ethernet (lance) were both 32bit masters.
(I don't remember ever having to worry about physical addresses.)
I'm sure I remember some old SCSI boards only being able to do 24bit DMA.
But I can't remember which bus interface they were.
Unlikely to be ISA because it has always been hard to get a motherboard
DMA channel into 'cascade mode'.

Might have been some EISA boards - anyone still use those?
So we are left with early PCI boards.

It really is worth looking at what actually needs it at all.

David

-
Registered Address Lakeside, Bramley Road, Mount Farm, Milton Keynes, MK1 1PT, UK
Registration No: 1397386 (Wales)