Memory Upgrade

I have upgraded the ram on my laptop from 4GB to 16GB. I have verified that the ram is compatible with the system. The system boots without any issues. It runs fine until I try to make a large file transfer or run a virtual machine. It crashes and reboots without warning. Essentially anything that require more memory than what the original memory could handle.

I have ran Memtester. The result is all ok.
I checked /etc/security/limits.conf and there is no mem limits set.
The bios does not give me any options for memory.
I do not see anything in the system logs from a reboot. It shows the virtual machine start stop and the startup after the crash.

What are some diagnostics I can use to see what is happening?
Is there anything I have to do the OS to handle the new memory?

What version of Parrot are you running? (include version, edition, and architecture)

Linux parrot 4.18.0-parrot10-amd64 #1 SMP Debian 4.18.10-2parrot10 (2018-11-17) x86_64 GNU/Linux

What method did you use to install Parrot? (Debian Standard / Debian GTK / parrot-experimental)

Debian Standard

Configured to multiboot with other systems? (yes / no)

No. Parrot is the only one

If there are any similar issues or solutions, link to them below:

If there are any error messages or relevant logs, post them below:

what is your formats and partitioning table information? maybe you have no swap or need more swap but im not sure without knowing what those are first

Disk /dev/mapper/sda5_crypt: 465.5 GiB, 499847790592 bytes, 976265216 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 4096 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes

Disk /dev/mapper/parrot–vg-root: 461.7 GiB, 495762538496 bytes, 968286208 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 4096 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes

Disk /dev/mapper/parrot–vg-swap_1: 3.8 GiB, 4081057792 bytes, 7970816 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 4096 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes

do you see the mistake? Sometimes the obvious one is the one that slips by us easiest. what formats are the partitions though just out of curiosity?

So I need to resize the swap partition.

Model: ATA HGST HTS725050A7 (scsi)
Disk /dev/sda: 500GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/4096B
Partition Table: msdos
Disk Flags:

Number Start End Size Type File system Flags
1 1049kB 256MB 255MB primary ext2 boot
2 257MB 500GB 500GB extended
5 257MB 500GB 500GB logical

Model: Linux device-mapper (linear) (dm)
Disk /dev/mapper/parrot–vg-swap_1: 4081MB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/4096B
Partition Table: loop
Disk Flags:

Number Start End Size File system Flags
1 0.00B 4081MB 4081MB linux-swap(v1)

Model: Linux device-mapper (linear) (dm)
Disk /dev/mapper/parrot–vg-root: 496GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/4096B
Partition Table: loop
Disk Flags:

Number Start End Size File system Flags
1 0.00B 496GB 496GB ext4

Error: /dev/mapper/sda5_crypt: unrecognised disk label
Model: Linux device-mapper (crypt) (dm)
Disk /dev/mapper/sda5_crypt: 500GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/4096B
Partition Table: unknown
Disk Flags:

yes but it looks a little off. is there a reason you chose ext2 and an msdos format? after re reading all the posts i see where you mentioned a virtual machine once, does that happen to be parrot and if so I would check the VM settings for the ram settings there

I installed parrot onto the host laptop using guided full disk encryption lvm option. I kept with the defaults during the install. The virtual machine I was running was in virtual box installing CAELinux, however the host crashed during the install as the memory usage reached 3.8Gb.

is there a way you can try to reinstall with the updated ISO? it may be an installer issue (there was one semi recently i believe or at least with a new install of a not too long outdated version. Maybe its just not liking the resize. I recommend using a physical disk for VM’s just because I don’t like them being msdos. Im pretty sure btrfs is an option for VM’s, If so I recommend that format as well to utilize snapshots.

I am going to reinstall the operating system with a better file system on it. I am making sure everything I need is backed up before I start. The installer I used to install it was fairly old it was a parrot 3 ISO.

Yes the installer has gone through some major re writing and now automatically favors btrfs so it makes it much easier while doing an auto install. Make sure to clean with the live cd and reboot into the installer after you get your important files backed up so you can make sure you start as cleanly as possible and you shouldn’t have any errors.

So i ran the installer with the new ram. It crashed during the install every time. I replaced the old ram and the install ran through. It is on BtrFS now. It runs fine with the old ram but with the new stuff it will randomly crash. The laptop was purchased from a Law Enforcement agency as a liquidation. I am fairly certain that it is in the hardware at this point. I have set up a dsk top just so I can continue to work and going to repurpose the laptop.

wait did you mix and match the ram?

No i replaced the ram with identical specs, higher capacity.

FWIW, I have Parrot 4.4 running on a 32-bit dual-core Atom netbook with 2GB RAM. It boots from a 32GB SDHC card. Installation defaulted to allocating 2GB swap. With just a pkg update running, there’s 720MB RAM in use.

The base system is surprisingly lean. Haven’t tried any of the apps yet though…

like identical as in the same brand size speed model version like every little thing lining up like a perfect match not matching the timings right?