booting linux on harvard architecture

Question

I was working on pandaboard, when this problem occurred to me. pandaboard uses OMAP 4430, a harvard based architecture. The board has 1GB memory (DDR2 ram). But a harvard architecture requires two memories right ?

Here is what I understand the linux kernel image is stored in MMC/SD card and then pulled out by the bootloader into memory. Now, where is the bootloader running from (is it the 1GB ram?). Where does the bootloader dump the kernel image ?(again, is it the 1GB ram ?)

Answer 1

ARM architecture is often called "modified Harvard". It has a single linear (4GB) memory space, but uses different buses (and caches) for code and data. This allows it to read code or execute data, just like x86.

Note that this does not hold for all ARM chips. Some of them (e.g. Cortex-M0 cores) use single bus for code and data, so they're actually von Neumann.