On i386, the vm_page tables are typically taken from the first 640k
   because this is the smallest chunk of physical memory available. With
   a large kernel, this might eat up last piece of memory below 16M,
   leaving no space for ISA DMA bounce buffers.

[i'm going through back mail here..]

Hmm.  Is there any reason why the kernel has to be resident in the
sub-16M "prime real estate" on large-memory x86 systems?

					- Bill