Maximum RAM in Vista 32 bit

Guybrush

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I have recently taken delivery of a new computer and although the Bios says there is 4gb ram installed windows is only showing 2813gb.

Is there maximum of RAM Vista will show, just like the big hard drive issues in Win XP SP1.

I have downloaded all the windows updates to now as requested by the company I bought the new computer from and to now we are both stumped.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated
 
You can't use 4Gig of ram in Vista 32 bit read more here
http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies-archive.cfm/779164.html
if you do a search you will find thousands of complaints about the same problem.

I have recently taken delivery of a new computer and although the Bios says there is 4gb ram installed windows is only showing 2813gb.

Is there maximum of RAM Vista will show, just like the big hard drive issues in Win XP SP1.

I have downloaded all the windows updates to now as requested by the company I bought the new computer from and to now we are both stumped.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated




it's a 32 bit problem not a vista problem

all memory needs an address, those are alocated to 4 gigs max

why is your system showing only 2813?

this might be your video card, it might be some memory address space reserved for hardware that uses memory...if the bios thinks some hardware might have it's own memory the os will set aside address alocation to be used by that hardware

that means your on board memory can't be used above that criteria

here's a pdf

http://forum.osnn.net/attachment.php?attachmentid=6193&d=1123270098
 
Last edited:
Can the PAE extension hack from XP be performed under Vista?

I have neither considered it nor am considering it, I can simply slap Vista-64 and go that route but, is that not an option?

AFAIK without delving further into this, I believe that performance is uneven and there may be severe slow-downs. Other than that, I am nto sure.
 
Can the PAE extension hack from XP be performed under Vista?

I have neither considered it nor am considering it, I can simply slap Vista-64 and go that route but, is that not an option?

AFAIK without delving further into this, I believe that performance is uneven and there may be severe slow-downs. Other than that, I am nto sure.
It should still work (haven't tried it myself, so I can't say for sure).

But as you mentioned already, it's definitely not recommended. It adds an additional level of paging, and can also cause serious stability issues with certain device drivers.
 
Guybrush, I would suggest simply moving to the 64-bit version of the OS if it is possible.

If not, I think you are going to have 2.8 - 3.25 GB of RAM available to you and the remainder may be used for paging or whatever else the memory management features deem necessary.

It's not exactly being wasted in the precise sense, but it's definitely not as useful as being able to address all of it for system tasks as needed.

Sorry bud, no software fix for this other than the OS change to 64-bit.
 
I find it interesting that someplace would sell you a system with 4GB of RAM with only a 32-bit OS installed. That seems a bit of a shady business tactic for a few extra bucks on their part IMHO. :(
 
This is a Windows limitation, the 2.6 kernel on x86 can utilize up to 64GB of RAM with 32-bit as long as PAE is compiled in the kernel. A single process can only utilize up to 2 (or 3, I forget) GB of RAM.
 
PAE does weird things on any 32bit OS. If you want more then 3GB ram go 64bit.
 
This is a Windows limitation, the 2.6 kernel on x86 can utilize up to 64GB of RAM with 32-bit as long as PAE is compiled in the kernel. A single process can only utilize up to 2 (or 3, I forget) GB of RAM.
It's a limitation of any vanilla 32-bit kernel, not just NT (Windows).

As you said, with Linux you specifically need a kernel with PAE support compiled in. In Windows, using the /PAE flag switches the kernel to ntoskrnlpa, which is ntoskrnl with PAE support. 32-bit versions of Windows like Server 2003, for example, support 64GB of RAM with PAE enabled.

PAE was created as a stop-gap measure by increasing the size of the address to 36 bits (hence the 64GB limit) and adding an additional level of address translation (three instead of two). Now with the availability of 64-bit CPUs and OS's, there aren't many good reasons to still fall back on PAE, given the performance and stability implications.
 
Many thanks for all your replies. I think I will eventually spend £200+ for the 64 bit version - she who must be obeyed permitting!

Incidentally, I spoke with the company's customer services and they advised me to remove the second stick of RAM myself and return it to them for a refund!! What happens to my warrenty then?!
 
In many major manufacturer's laptop cases they have an easy access panel on the bottom to access the RAM. I would ask the question again, but document who you talked to and when just in case there is some question.
 
Many thanks for all your replies. I think I will eventually spend £200+ for the 64 bit version - she who must be obeyed permitting!

Incidentally, I spoke with the company's customer services and they advised me to remove the second stick of RAM myself and return it to them for a refund!! What happens to my warrenty then?!

Have them send you an email describing exactly that. If they give you sh!t about the warranty, you have it in writing they asked you to remove it yourself.
 

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