[Mageia-discuss] Installer: Server v. desktop kernel: No choice?

TJ andrewsfarm at gmail.com
Sun Jul 17 14:57:45 CEST 2011


On 07/17/2011 07:58 AM, Doug Laidlaw wrote:
> On Sat, 16 Jul 2011 08:00:03 PM mageia-discuss-request at mageia.org wrote:
>> Message: 2
>> Date: Fri, 15 Jul 2011 18:45:43 +0100
>> From: Maurice Batey<maurice at bcs.org.uk>
>> To: mageia-discuss at mageia.org
>> Subject: [Mageia-discuss] Installer: Server v. desktop kernel: No
>>          choice?
>> Message-ID:<pan.2011.07.15.17.45.42.391789 at bcs.org.uk>
>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-2022-jp
>>
>> Having installed Mageia-1 (from DVD), I find it has installed the
>> server kernels, rather than the desktop kernels.
>>
>> Presumably that's because my PC has 4GB RAM, but - on this 1-user system
>> - I would have preferred the desktop kernels to be installed.
>>
>> Did I miss an installation option, to choose server v. desktop?
>>
>> If not, could the installer be given such an option - perhaps in
>> some 'Advanced' tab?
>>
>> That would avoid having to swap kernels with:
>>
>>        urpmi kernel-desktop-latest
>>        urpmi kernel-desktop-devel-latest
>>        urpmi nvidia-current-kernel-desktop-latest
>>
>> (assuming that will do the trick here).
>>
>> --
>> /\/\aurice
>>          (Retired in Surrey, UK)     Registered Linux User #487649
>>
> I raised this one on the Mandriva list.  I was told that it was because I had
> a 32-bit version installed on a 64-bit capable machine.  Sure enough, when I
> installed the 64-bit version, I got the desktop kernel by default.
>
> Doug.
>
Well, that explains it. Mandriva has been insisting on installing the 
server kernel since I bought this Sempron 3100+ cpu/motherboard combo 
from a recycler on Ebay a couple of years ago, even though the 
motherboard supports a maximum of 2GB of DDR RAM. (I chose it because I 
needed a new mobo, was, as always, strapped for cash, and wanted to use 
my existing RAM modules.) With Mandriva, I switched to the desktop 
kernel manually, but with Mageia I decided to stick with the server 
kernel just to see how it worked out. Frankly, I see little if any 
difference in speed or operation from a user's perspective between the 
two 32-bit kernels on my machine, so when I finally get the time to 
switch to Mageia as my production install I'll continue with the server 
kernel.

I looked into installing the 64-bit version of Mandriva when I 
discovered my cpu was 64-bit capable, but concluded at the time that 
there was no real advantage on this machine since the maximum RAM is 
less than 4 GB. So far, I've been happy with that, but in light of 
recent development, is there any reason why I should reconsider?

TJ



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