[ipxe-devel] question about memory in ipxe

[Michael Brown]

On Tuesday 14 Aug 2012 07:36:22 Wigi Vei Oliveros wrote:
> > Any memory forming part of the heap, along with the memory used by the
> > iPXE image itself, will be permanently lost for the duration of the
> > system boot if booting from SAN.
> 
> How about other protocols like HTTP? Will the memory used by the image
> be lost as well?
> If I'm trying to download a 30 MB image, that's 30 MB less RAM for the
> duration of the boot?

No; if you're using a non-SAN boot (e.g. directly loading a bzImage kernel via 
HTTP), then iPXE gets a chance to free its memory and restore the system 
memory map before starting the kernel.

However, since iPXE may be used to perform a SAN or non-SAN boot entirely at 
the discretion of the user, iPXE must keep its total heap size small just in 
case the user chooses to perform a SAN boot.

Michael