Re: Memory defined at boot time incorrect

[Greg Troxel <gdt%lexort.com@localhost>]

Andy Ruhl <acruhl%gmail.com@localhost> writes:

> I have a new-ish motherboard with an amd64 capable CPU, however I'm
> using i386 on it because this system has existed since long before
> amd64 was a thing.

Not that you asked how to do this, but changing a system from i386 to
amd64 in place is doable, assuming you have physical console access.  I
did this on one system without too much trouble, basically:

 - making sure I had a bootable amd64 CD that worked on the machine

 - installing an amd64 kernel and booting it instead

 - installing amd64 userland and merging /etc (using INSTALL-NetBSD from
   pkgsrc/sysutils/etcmanage), and then diffing the unpacked etc sets
   against /etc.  This is good to do anyway (not saying make them match
   - just understand every difference)

 - running MAKEDEV (the new one after merging etc set contents!) in /dev
   as some device numbers have changed).  This might have required using
   the rescue CD; I don't remember

 - marking all packages for rebuild: "pkg_admin set rebuild=YES \*"

 - pkg_rolling-replace

 - clean out i386 libs from /usr/lib and /lib, and also look for things
   in {,/usr}/{,s}bin that did not get an updated ctime from unpacking
   userland and pruning those

I know that sounds like a lot, but I find it easier and more reliable
than reinstalling and trying to move config.