today I want tell you a little trick to find information about the RAM ( or others device/components ) installed on your system by unix os.
These information are very useful if you don't know you RAM type (DDR or DDR2 ecc ecc) and speed (400 or 800 MHz) and you need upgrade you system for example. You can find this information from a shell prompt on your unix system with dmidecode utility.
dmidecode is a tool for dumping a computers DMI (some say SMBIOS) table contents in a human-readable format. This table contains a description of the systems hardware components, as well as other useful pieces of information such as serial numbers and BIOS revision.
You can check info on your RAM with the following command by root user:
dmidecode --type 17
the output will be like this:
Handle 0x002D, DMI type 17, 27 bytes
Memory Device
Array Handle: 0x002A
Error Information Handle: No Error
Total Width: 64 bits
Data Width: 64 bits
Size: 1024 MB
Form Factor: DIMM
Set: None
Locator: Slot-2
Bank Locator: Channel B
Type: DDR2
Type Detail: Synchronous
Speed: 800 MHz (1.2 ns)
Manufacturer: Samsung
Serial Number: 621127BA
Asset Tag: 53510838
Part Number: 4D332037385432383633515A532D43463720
Handle 0x002E, DMI type 17, 27 bytes
Memory Device
Array Handle: 0x002A
Error Information Handle: No Error
Total Width: 64 bits
Data Width: 64 bits
Size: 2048 MB
Form Factor: DIMM
Set: None
Locator: Slot-4
Bank Locator: Channel B
Type: DDR2
Type Detail: Synchronous
Speed: 800 MHz (1.2 ns)
Manufacturer: Hyundai Electronics
Serial Number: 00002223
Asset Tag: 41410843
Part Number: 48594D503132355536344350382D53362020
Using dmidecode you can check info about other devices installed in your pc too. You need only change the parameter --type from 17 to another values.... The SMBIOS specification defines the following DMI types:
Type Information
----------------------------------------
0 BIOS
1 System
2 Base Board
3 Chassis
4 Processor
5 Memory Controller
6 Memory Module
7 Cache
8 Port Connector
9 System Slots
10 On Board Devices
11 OEM Strings
12 System Configuration Options
13 BIOS Language
14 Group Associations
15 System Event Log
16 Physical Memory Array
17 Memory Device
18 32-bit Memory Error
19 Memory Array Mapped Address
20 Memory Device Mapped Address
21 Built-in Pointing Device
22 Portable Battery
23 System Reset
24 Hardware Security
25 System Power Controls
26 Voltage Probe
27 Cooling Device
28 Temperature Probe
29 Electrical Current Probe
30 Out-of-band Remote Access
31 Boot Integrity Services
32 System Boot
33 64-bit Memory Error
34 Management Device
35 Management Device Component
36 Management Device Threshold Data
37 Memory Channel
38 IPMI Device
39 Power Supply
