max memory

  • Thread starter Thread starter Sebastiaan
  • Start date Start date
S

Sebastiaan

I read that Vista (just as XP) supports up to 4 GB under the 32 bit
editions.

But does anyone know if under Vista you will finally be able to allocate the
whole 4 GB yourself (applications)?
Or is this still limited to 3 GB for applications and 1 GB to Kernel (iow
wasted memory/money)?

I called microsoft (netherlands) and they were unable to answer this
question.

Thanks.
 
Hi Sebastiaan,

Under x86, no change (more like about 2.7-3.2GB depending on the system).
Has to do with the number of addresses allowable in a 32-bit environment,
it's not a limitation of windows so much as it is a limitation of 32 bit
processing. Under x64 you can address a lot more - a lot.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
 
Thank you for the fast reply. ^_^

It amazes me that Vista (like XP) still has this 'problem'.
When looking at
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsser.../comparefeatures.mspx#Hardware Specifications
I don't understand why server2003 is able to work up to 64 GB with the 32bit
version and Vista 3 years later still can't work beyond 3 GB.

Must be "on request of our customers" as microsoft would put it.


And sadly, not that many games appear to run on x64.

For example:
Valvesoftware (Half Life, Counter Strike, etc) already stated that they
wouldn't make x64 compatible versions and that it's a problem within the
WOW64 that would cause the arising problems with the current software and
thus not being their problem to fix.
 
Vista Ultimate x64 supports up to 128 GBs of physical RAM. You can get a
Dell Precision workstation with 64 GBs RAM if you have the cash splurge.
 
Running Vista Business x64 wouldn't be a problem if games didn't have so
much problems with the WOW64 as Valvesoftware claims there to be (the
problems with Half Life etc being a lot of crashes).
Plus the costs of antivirus today that will run on x64 without killing the
performance.
But it's the compatibility issues between x64 and the mainstream of programs
that will keep me bound to x86.


My new source of anger at MS would be, why does 2003 SP1 support over 4 GB
and why doesn't Vista (3 years later).
But that is something beyond the scope of this newsgroup. ~_^

--

Sebastiaan

Andre Da Costa said:
Vista Ultimate x64 supports up to 128 GBs of physical RAM. You can get a
Dell Precision workstation with 64 GBs RAM if you have the cash splurge.
Click to expand...
 
Rick Rogers said:
Hi Sebastiaan,

Under x86, no change (more like about 2.7-3.2GB depending on the system).
Has to do with the number of addresses allowable in a 32-bit environment,
it's not a limitation of windows so much as it is a limitation of 32 bit
processing. Under x64 you can address a lot more - a lot.
Click to expand...


I thought the /PAE switch in boot.ini did something about this?

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms791485.aspx

ss.
 
Applications remain at 2GB each. The full 4GB is used, but only about 3GB
is allocated for the user. The system uses the rest. How is partly
determined by the BIOS settings. This has been batted about ad nauseum in
this ng so feel free to search on "4gb." Quite a list of messages on the
subject.
 
uh... did you not just say "I thought the /PAE switch in boot.ini did
something about this?"????
my point, is that there IS no boot.ini in vista, and to add the PAE switch
you have to use bcdedit.... get it now?
 
I will have a look at /PAE under XP.
I should have a machine laying around with 4 GB somewhere at work to test
this on. ^_^
Sadly I don't have a machine to test this on for Vista. v_v

With /PAE used in boot.ini (XP) and BCDEdit (Vista, as mentioned by Troy in
his post), how far could windows see/use memory?
The page on msdn does say that XP wont see beyond 4 GB, but they don't
mention how far Vista will see.
 
The method that 2003 uses to address beyond 4GB is called Address Windowing
Extensions or AWE
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Address_Windowing_Extensions). It's a paging
method used to move memory around when the OS is called upon. If you have
been around PC's for a while, it's very much like the old LIM memory scheme
used to get around the original 640K limit in DOS.

Software has to be specifically written to utilize it and very few things
are at this point. The only one that comes to mind immediately is SQL
Server. That said, performance is definitely sub-par compared to x64
versions.

Myself, I've been around long enough to see us all beat up against the DOS
16bit 640K limit, the Win3.0 hybrid 16/32 bit 16mb limit, and now the 32bit
4GB limit. Every time I catch myself wondering why we need more than 4gb, I
remember that many have said that same thing over the years on just about
every hardware limit along the way. So I choose to use the occasion of a new
OS to change to 64-bit now and deal with the limitations rather than waiting
a couple of years and having to do a full reinstall then.
 
Back
Top