4GB ram = should have 64 bit OS?

If you have 4GB of ram, should you use a vista 64 bit OS, will it not work as well if you don't?

Windows will only be able to use 2.5GB of it in 32bit. It will hurt performance when you start to heavily mulitask or run some really demanding programs.

Thanks, think you mean 3.5gb tho

Any 32 bit OS can only allocate up to 4 GB of memory(2 ^ 32 bytes), 64 bit OS can adress a hell lot more than that (2 ^ 64 bytes). However I think Vista has a hardcoded limit to 16 or 32 GB(I don't remember) of RAM.

EDIT : See this article for RAM limits

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa366778.aspx

Any 32 bit OS can only allocate up to 3.5 GB of memory(2 ^ 32 bytes), 64 bit OS can adress a hell lot more than that (2 ^ 64 bytes). However I think Vista has a hardcoded limit to 16 or 32 GB(I don't remember) of RAM.

gigatrainer

Yeah I just got that article too, I was sort of right(It limits to 16 GB for home premium and 128 GB to th above versions).

It can address 4gb total, including GPU vram... so if you have a 512 GPU vram, then you can probably use around 3.25 or less of ram, as some is used on system resources, and also more will be used on running the OS

just a side note, wouldnt use 64-bit vista. Not stable, little support and prolly gonna cause you more problems than its worth. If you want to use ur full 4gb and want a 64-bit OS, wait for Windows 7. Even the beta is extremely stable, just not good graphics support.

nVidia seems to have drivers out for Windows 7 from pretty long(I use them, they're pretty good). I'm not sure about ATi however. And pretty much every driver that worked with Vista has worked for me in Windows 7 (32 bit)

heres the thing, more ram is actually better no matter what...but 32bit Vista OS(If thats what you are talking about) Only handles 3.2G-3.5G not a HUGE difference from 4G...

just a side note, wouldnt use 64-bit vista. Not stable, little support and prolly gonna cause you more problems than its worth. If you want to use ur full 4gb and want a 64-bit OS, wait for Windows 7. Even the beta is extremely stable, just not good graphics support.

StingrayA

Theres absolutely no stability or performance difference between Vista 32 and Vista 64.

just a side note, wouldnt use 64-bit vista. Not stable, little support and prolly gonna cause you more problems than its worth. If you want to use ur full 4gb and want a 64-bit OS, wait for Windows 7. Even the beta is extremely stable, just not good graphics support.

StingrayA