No 4 gigs on XP 32 bit,correct?

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dreamer3kx

Limp Gawd
Joined
Oct 28, 2007
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453
Sorry if this topic was beat to death but I just want to make sure before I upgrade to 4 gigs,I know vista/XP 64 bit are compatible.
 
That's correct, you'll get 4GBs - memory used by devices, the video card is most of this, so if you have a 512MB vid card, you'll only see 3.3 - 3.5GBs, maybe less. It's all system dependent.
 
No 32bit envirionment will make use of the full 4GB's of RAM, I'm running 4GB's with WXP 32bit and it runs fine, howevery it only shows up as 3.25GB's.
 
Before I switched to x64 Vista, I could only see 2.5gb of ram, but I have sli 512 mb gpus. I don't see where that 1.5gb of usage comes from. I can see 1gb from cards but where is the other 500mb of ram being addressed too?

Don't matter I switched to x64 anyways.
 
Other devices, sound, hard drive controller, anything at all in the system can use memory. Video cards just happen to use the most.
 
Karant said:
No 32bit envirionment will make use of the full 4GB's of RAM, I'm running 4GB's with WXP 32bit and it runs fine, howevery it only shows up as 3.25GB's.
Click to expand...


err no,

a 32bit OS utilising memory-mapping for hardware (like pretty much every 32bit OS does) cannot address 2^32 bytes of RAM

you yourselve said it yrself when you then went on to say only 3.25G shows up. 3.25Gig of RAM for your present hardware is all yr setup will address
rip out yr gfx card and you will be able to address some more BUT you won't be able to adress all of it
 
eeyrjmr said:
err no,

a 32bit OS utilising memory-mapping for hardware (like pretty much every 32bit OS does) cannot address 2^32 bytes of RAM

you yourselve said it yrself when you then went on to say only 3.25G shows up. 3.25Gig of RAM for your present hardware is all yr setup will address
rip out yr gfx card and you will be able to address some more BUT you won't be able to adress all of it
Click to expand...

That happens to be what he said only you could actually understand what he was saying.
He said you would never be able to see all 4GB under a 32bit OS and it would show up as ~3-3.5 GB even if you had 64GB of RAM in there.
 
I've yet to see a situation where 3.5 gigs hadn't been enough in XP. It's really a non-issue.
 
Finn said:
I've yet to see a situation where 3.5 gigs hadn't been enough in XP. It's really a non-issue.
Click to expand...

lol you mean like how we used to have 16mb of RAM and never thought we'd need more because we went far beyond 256kb of ram?

Your computer will always need memory. It will need memory until you can replace your hard drive with it 100%. THATS when you'll stop needing more memory.

But unfortunately Windows 32bit cannot go beyond 4gb, thus hard drives cannot be replaced by them just yet. Not to mention RAM cannot retain data when your computer is powered down.
 
retrorocketz said:
Seeing 3.5 with pae.
Click to expand...

Unless you're running a server based OS from MSFT, PAE does diddly anymore.

Your processor will report PAE mode because it sees more than 4GB of RAM, it will show up in the System Panel as running in PAE mode, but PAE in the XP / Vista kernel has been de-clawed.
 
der_jackal said:
Unless you're running a server based OS from MSFT, PAE does diddly anymore.

Your processor will report PAE mode because it sees more than 4GB of RAM, it will show up in the System Panel as running in PAE mode, but PAE in the XP / Vista kernel has been de-clawed.
Click to expand...
Yep, I never got PAE to work in a non-server O/S.
 
der_jackal said:
Your processor will report PAE mode because it sees more than 4GB of RAM, it will show up in the System Panel as running in PAE mode, but PAE in the XP / Vista kernel has been de-clawed.
Click to expand...

Windows reports PAE, because it is running in PAE mode.
 
Karant said:
No 32bit envirionment will make use of the full 4GB's of RAM, I'm running 4GB's with WXP 32bit and it runs fine, howevery it only shows up as 3.25GB's.
Click to expand...

This is false. This statement is limited to Windows 32 environments only.
 
der_jackal said:
If it was really running in true PAE mode you would have more than 4GB of RAM addressable.
Click to expand...

It depends on what you call true. Windows has switched the CPU into PAE mode, it just doesn't use more than 4GB.

The CPU doesn't switch itself into that just because you install more than 4GB RAM
 
Azhar said:
lol you mean like how we used to have 16mb of RAM and never thought we'd need more because we went far beyond 256kb of ram?

Your computer will always need memory. It will need memory until you can replace your hard drive with it 100%. THATS when you'll stop needing more memory.

But unfortunately Windows 32bit cannot go beyond 4gb, thus hard drives cannot be replaced by them just yet. Not to mention RAM cannot retain data when your computer is powered down.
Click to expand...

No I mean like how we use 32-bit apps that consume 2 gigs at most anyway and practically no app takes even that by itself. That leaves space for the OS and say, 10 photoshops running in the background if you have 3.5 gigs on XP32.

So yes, 3.5gigs is more than enough unless you install bloatware such as Vista.

Using a 64-bit OS to run 32-bit apps is similar to carrying 8 tyres in your car even though you can only use 4 at a time. Sure you get a lot more compressed air stored but you ain't ever going to use it.
 
Finn, are you saying that all 32bit applications can use a maximum of 2 GB RAM all together? Because that is not true
 
Re: PAE

PAE allows the use of RAM over 4GB. However, the RAM taken under 4GB is *still* taken. PAE doesn't magically make these resources free up. That's why if you have 4GB, and have PAE on or off, you won't notice a difference. PAE is useful if you have MORE than 4GB.

On servers with 16GB, they report about 15.8GB usable, because the system still uses that space under the 4GB barrier. PAE just allows the OS to step over it, in a way.
 
Re: PAE

Modern hardware have memory remapping. Remapping is also needed when you run a 64bit OS for it to see it all
 
Theoretical question:

If I had a WinXP 32-bit box with 4GB of RAM in it, and wanted to use one of those RAMDisk programs to make a drive letter with 2GB (thus leaving 2GB for XP), would that work?

ie. Would that allow me to use all 4GB of my RAM, or would taking 2GB for a RAM disk only leave me 1 - 1.5GB of system memory for XP?

I don't have a PC with 4GB to test - just curious.

-Robert
 
Valnar said:
Theoretical question:

If I had a WinXP 32-bit box with 4GB of RAM in it, and wanted to use one of those RAMDisk programs to make a drive letter with 2GB (thus leaving 2GB for XP), would that work?

ie. Would that allow me to use all 4GB of my RAM, or would taking 2GB for a RAM disk only leave me 1 - 1.5GB of system memory for XP?

I don't have a PC with 4GB to test - just curious.

-Robert
Click to expand...

bump, i'd like an answer to this as well.
 
No, a ram drive cannot just make use of it like that. It would need to do some serious kernel stuff to make that happen. Windows' memory manager doesn't allow anyone to address memory above 4G, not even when you load the pae kernel
 
SuperSubZero said:
Re: PAE

PAE allows the use of RAM over 4GB. However, the RAM taken under 4GB is *still* taken. PAE doesn't magically make these resources free up. That's why if you have 4GB, and have PAE on or off, you won't notice a difference. PAE is useful if you have MORE than 4GB.

On servers with 16GB, they report about 15.8GB usable, because the system still uses that space under the 4GB barrier. PAE just allows the OS to step over it, in a way.
Click to expand...

True. A 32 bit system will use all of 4GB of RAM, just not all from those little sticks you insert into your motherboard. It will first allocate it to your hardware devices, and you get what's left. PAE is 36 bit and has been disabled on XP and Vista. The only machine we have it works on is a box with server 2003 enterprise with a 64 bit CPU. You're out of luck on anything less.
 
der_jackal said:
This statement is also false, this is limited to "consumer" editions of Windows 32 environments.
Click to expand...
Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't the processor play a factor? I thought that--no matter what OS--you're not going to see more than 4GB with a 32-bit processor.
 
Slightly off topic - but how much RAM does OSX handle? Linux?

Just curiosity...I dont have 4 gigs either way lol
 
xxEIEIOxx said:
Yes, the CPU pretty much IS the limitation.
Click to expand...

If you look further up in the thread, you'll see PAE is mentioned in several posts. The CPU is NOT the limitation. Microsoft says they put the 4GB address space limitation into xp and vista because of too many bad drivers.
 
pallesen said:
If you look further up in the thread, you'll see PAE is mentioned in several posts. The CPU is NOT the limitation. Microsoft says they put the 4GB address space limitation into xp and vista because of too many bad drivers.
Click to expand...

Yes, however since PAE is 36 bit, you must have a 64 bit CPU to use it. It will not work ever on a 32 bit CPU.
 
PAE is something that belongs to the 32-bit CPU, so yes it will work.

Depending on the implementation, PAE can also be more than 36 bit
 
pallesen said:
PAE is something that belongs to the 32-bit CPU, so yes it will work.

Depending on the implementation, PAE can also be more than 36 bit
Click to expand...

PAE is for 32 bit operating systems, not processors. If Intel ever made a PAE capable processor that was not 64 bit they were few, if they existed at all, I do not remember. I am sure there are no AMD processors that are 32 bit and support it, as they came out with 64 bit a long time ago. I have 3 servers at work with 4GB of RAM and 32 bit Windows Server 2003 Enterprise. 1 machine has a 64 bit CPU, and shows 4GB or RAM, PAE is automatically enabled. The other 2 have 32 bit CPUs, and show 3.5 GB of RAM, PAE is not an option. In this context, the CPU is THE limitation of the system, there is nothing else in these 2 machines holding it back. And I really dislike Microsoft's excuse that it is disabled on XP and Vista due to bad drivers. Most any XP driver can be loaded on Server 2003.
 
All 32-bit Intel CPUs have had support for 36-bit PAE since forever. PAE is a mode of the CPU. It is not something the OS makes up.

With that said, there are of course other factors in the computer that determines if more than 4 GB is an option.
 
pallesen said:
All 32-bit Intel CPUs have had support for 36-bit PAE since forever. PAE is a mode of the CPU. It is not something the OS makes up.

With that said, there are of course other factors in the computer that determines if more than 4 GB is an option.
Click to expand...

I never claimed the OS made it up. It does have to support it. It refuses to work on our P4 machines. I will agree there are other factors, and I will leave it at that.
 
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