What happened to other GB of RAM?

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xfactor19990

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#1 xfactor19990
Member since 2004 • 10917 Posts

ok so i have a 32 bit os, and well i bought 4GB and windows reads 3GB isn't it supposed to be 3.5?

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danwallacefan

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#2 danwallacefan
Member since 2008 • 2413 Posts

ok so i have a 32 bit os, and well i bought 4GB and windows reads 3GB isn't it supposed to be 3.5?

xfactor19990

32 bit operating systems only read 3GB of memory.

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rronqe

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#3 rronqe
Member since 2007 • 207 Posts
well, I have vista 32 bit, and I have total of 4.0 gb ram, but i reads 3,5 gb. If u have Vista, make sure u have service pack 1 installed. I don't know about XP
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JigglyWiggly_

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#4 JigglyWiggly_
Member since 2009 • 24625 Posts
well, I have vista 32 bit, and I have total of 4.0 gb ram, but i reads 3,5 gb. If u have Vista, make sure u have service pack 1 installed. I don't know about XPrronqe
No this is the same for ALL 32 bit os's. You must subtract it from your video memory, as well as other peripherals with onboard memory. The OS will also usually take safety precautions, like when I had a 512 meg card, XP went to 2.75 gigs. Albeit that was a long time ago, 32bit OS's are junk to me :) I have 7 pcs in this house all of them are on a 64bit OS... well except my router, that has a p4 @ 3.6ghz(not 64) running freebsd.
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mike4realz

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#5 mike4realz
Member since 2003 • 2577 Posts
well, I have vista 32 bit, and I have total of 4.0 gb ram, but i reads 3,5 gb. If u have Vista, make sure u have service pack 1 installed. I don't know about XPrronqe
^^^this...vista service pack 1 will show that u have 4GB but dat don't mean it'll utilize all 4GB
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JigglyWiggly_

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#6 JigglyWiggly_
Member since 2009 • 24625 Posts
[QUOTE="rronqe"]well, I have vista 32 bit, and I have total of 4.0 gb ram, but i reads 3,5 gb. If u have Vista, make sure u have service pack 1 installed. I don't know about XPmike4realz
^^^this...vista service pack 1 will show that u have 4GB but dat don't mean it'll utilize all 4GB

What's the point of seeing the ram if you can't use it?
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opamando

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#7 opamando
Member since 2007 • 1268 Posts

[QUOTE="mike4realz"][QUOTE="rronqe"]well, I have vista 32 bit, and I have total of 4.0 gb ram, but i reads 3,5 gb. If u have Vista, make sure u have service pack 1 installed. I don't know about XPJigglyWiggly_
^^^this...vista service pack 1 will show that u have 4GB but dat don't mean it'll utilize all 4GB

What's the point of seeing the ram if you can't use it?

So people won't make post asking, "where did my RAM go" :P

Yeah, I feel it is silly, but it probably stops a lot of complaints.

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xfactor19990

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#8 xfactor19990
Member since 2004 • 10917 Posts
well i just thought by only recognizing 4GB it was 4-512megabyte card, so i was expecting 3.5.
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GTR12

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#9 GTR12
Member since 2006 • 13490 Posts

well i just thought by only recognizing 4GB it was 4-512megabyte card, so i was expecting 3.5.xfactor19990

Ur card could have VRAM, where it takes ram from the memory for demanding games. eg; my card has 512MB ram, but its also got 1gb of vram, and it takes 512 vram, so i can run games at 1920*1200.

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imprezawrx500

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#10 imprezawrx500
Member since 2004 • 19187 Posts
you wont get more than 3.3gb with 32bit os. 3gb is common if you have lots of vram.
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codezer0

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#11 codezer0
Member since 2004 • 15898 Posts

[QUOTE="xfactor19990"]

ok so i have a 32 bit os, and well i bought 4GB and windows reads 3GB isn't it supposed to be 3.5?

danwallacefan

32 bit operating systems only read 3GB of memory.

Not true. Not entirely, anyway. How to sum up the correct information...? In short: - intel made the specification many, many years ago, and the idea then of having systems with 4GB of RAM or more seemed ludicrous at the time. - original x86 specification for 32-bit systems had a 4GB physical memory limit - because they reasoned that there was no chance in hell that we'd still be using 32-bit OS's and hardware by then, they chose to have the last 512MB of RAM allocated/reserved for I/O addresses. - optionally, some BIOSes will also address a local "cache" of however much video RAM you have. So if you've a video card with 512MB of RAM, then you'll have 3GB left to yourself (512MB reserved for I/O and GPU RAM) - There have been ways to get around that for a while, because multi-CPU workstations and servers have broken past that barrier well before any home systems ever have. The problem, is that drivers for server/workstation-grade hardware is usually much more scrutinized, and will handle things like PAE and having their I/O remapped fine. Considering that we can't even get hardware manufacturers to follow the Plug 'n Play specification (written more than 20 years ago) properly even now, what makes you think even half of them will write their drivers for your video card, your chipset, or your webcam so properly? Thus, most 32-bit OS's impose that PAE is disabled, even when the CPU, OS, and motherboard are aware of being able to use it. There has been some ways of being able to force at least the I/O addresses to go into the memory space beyond 4GB limit for 32-bit OS's, and CPU's being made today will support it. But it's up to the motherboard and BIOS to support it, and even though many chip sets now can support it fine, the BIOS writers choose to leave this option out. To date, I've only heard of SOME (not all) top-end intel chipset boards even having the option for being able to enable MMIO remapping, which will at least get you more of your RAM back to you. But then you also have to factor in whether it caches addressing of your video memory, too. And some drivers simply will spazz out if they have to address such a high memory address and you get undue instability.
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subrosian

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#12 subrosian
Member since 2005 • 14232 Posts
That's because it's not a 4gb "memory limit" - it's a 4gb *address space* limit. Your system uses address space for more than just memory, it has to address devices as well as your system memory and video memory. When all is said and done, you will see less than 3.5 gb on a 32-bit system.