Useable RAM in XP Home or Pro

[Guest]

Are there any limits in the amount of Useable RAM while using Windows XP Home
or Professional? Also would using large amounts of RAM cause conflicts
elsewhere, with other hardware (graphics cards etc.)?

 

[Malke]

Are there any limits in the amount of Useable RAM while using Windows
XP Home or Professional? Also would using large amounts of RAM cause
conflicts elsewhere, with other hardware (graphics cards etc.)?

XP Pro supports up to 4GB of RAM. Probably Home does the same, but I'm
not sure.
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/evaluation/features.mspx

There are some caveats with using 4GB of RAM:
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/winxppro/maintain/sp2mempr.mspx

The amount of RAM is also limited by what your motherboard will support.
System RAM will not affect your other hardware such as video card. Most
end users will have no reason to have more than 1 or possibly 2 GB or
RAM in their system. If you are having a problem that you think is
related to memory, post back with details and someone will help you.

Malke

 

[Shenan Stanley]

Are there any limits in the amount of Useable RAM while using Windows
XP Home or Professional? Also would using large amounts of RAM cause
conflicts elsewhere, with other hardware (graphics cards etc.)?

4GB.
So for most people - however much RAM their hardware will allow.
However - after 2GB - Windows starts utilizing RAM differently than you
think. It takes a "little tweaking".

As for conflicts with other devices.. no.. RAM is just considered a part of
your motherboard.. It doesn't take up address space or anything.

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

Are there any limits in the amount of Useable RAM while using Windows
XP Home or Professional?

It's the same for both versions--4GB. That may be more than your motherboard
holds, and is probably more than you can make effective use of..

Also would using large amounts of RAM cause
conflicts elsewhere, with other hardware (graphics cards etc.)?

No, but to use 4GB of RAM you have to add a switch to a line in the
[Operating Systems] section of boot.ini. Change /fastdetect to /fastdetect
/3GB

 

[John John]

Hi Ken,

I'm not certain that the /3GB switch works on the Windows NT, 2000 or XP
Workstation or standard Server platform. My understanding is that the
switch only works on the Enterprise, Advanced and Datacenter Server
versions. Is that still the case or does XP support the switch?

John

IanCoward wrote:

Are there any limits in the amount of Useable RAM while using Windows
XP Home or Professional?

It's the same for both versions--4GB. That may be more than your motherboard
holds, and is probably more than you can make effective use of..

Also would using large amounts of RAM cause
conflicts elsewhere, with other hardware (graphics cards etc.)?

No, but to use 4GB of RAM you have to add a switch to a line in the
[Operating Systems] section of boot.ini. Change /fastdetect to /fastdetect
/3GB

 

[Shenan Stanley]

I'm not certain that the /3GB switch works on the Windows NT, 2000 or
XP Workstation or standard Server platform. My understanding is that
the switch only works on the Enterprise, Advanced and Datacenter
Server versions. Is that still the case or does XP support the
switch?

Switch has always worked for XP.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/833721

http://www.sysinternals.com/Information/bootini.html

http://www.microsoft.com/resources/...Windows/XP/all/reskit/en-us/prmc_str_masc.asp

http://www.winguides.com/registry/display.php/1268

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

Hi Ken,

I'm not certain that the /3GB switch works on the Windows NT, 2000 or
XP Workstation or standard Server platform. My understanding is that
the switch only works on the Enterprise, Advanced and Datacenter
Server versions. Is that still the case or does XP support the
switch?

My understanding s that the switch works in XP. However, I hasten to add
that I have no personal experience with it and can't speak with assurance.

--
Ken Blake - Microsoft MVP Windows: Shell/User
Please reply to the newsgroup

IanCoward wrote:

Are there any limits in the amount of Useable RAM while using
Windows XP Home or Professional?

It's the same for both versions--4GB. That may be more than your
motherboard holds, and is probably more than you can make effective
use of..

Also would using large amounts of RAM cause
conflicts elsewhere, with other hardware (graphics cards etc.)?

No, but to use 4GB of RAM you have to add a switch to a line in the
[Operating Systems] section of boot.ini. Change /fastdetect to
/fastdetect /3GB

 

[Gerry Cornell]

Ian

Adding RAM beyond a certain point brings no benefit. Using RAM is
quicker in terms of read / write speeds than using the pagefile. If the
available physical memory is exhausted the machine will use the page
file. If this happens regularly then adding RAM memory will be
beneficial within the limits others have explained. Look at the
performance tab in Task Manager after a testing session. See if the Peak
has exceeded total RAM memory.

--


Hope this helps.

Gerry
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[Guest]

SThis advise is terrible. I followed it, adding the / 3GB flag to boot.ini
and had to spend $35 to get Microsoft's technical help to spend three hours
to cure the problem your advise caused: with my DELL Dimension 4700 loaded
with four 1GB RAM chips setup shows 4GB are loaded correctly but Contrto
Panel's System and right clicking my computer show 2.99GB. (.01 is reserved
for Video). With a 3GB flag boot.ini prevents booting. Using safe mode to
boot, safe mode, safe mode with command line, will not provide the desktop
(says it cannot be accessed) and getting to boot.ini no edit program
(notepad, wordpad, winword, or Norton Commander) can be used to edit out the
flag. Microsoft had me use properties on My Computer, Settings on Startup
and Recovery, Edit the startup options and then could edit out the flag with
the Notepad display of boot.ini. Microsoft's (800-936-5700) position on
their(this) forum is that any advise is questionable, as I found out, and use
it at your own risk. Microsoft confirmed that if 4GB is indicated to be
correctly installed (using setup upon booting), all of it will be used by
Windows XP Home Edition. You can comment back to me at: (e-mail address removed).
************************************************************

Are there any limits in the amount of Useable RAM while using Windows
XP Home or Professional?

It's the same for both versions--4GB. That may be more than your motherboard
holds, and is probably more than you can make effective use of..

Also would using large amounts of RAM cause
conflicts elsewhere, with other hardware (graphics cards etc.)?

No, but to use 4GB of RAM you have to add a switch to a line in the
[Operating Systems] section of boot.ini. Change /fastdetect to /fastdetect
/3GB

 

[Mak]

Sorry Ken, /3GB has nothing to do with physical memory (RAM), it affects
only how virtual address space is split for given process. (virtual
addressable space per process - 4GB (OS 32-bit)).
I.E. no /3GB - 2GB for user mode / 2 GB for kernel. With /3GB - 3GB user
mode / 1GB for kernel. Doesn't matter how much RAM is installed, even if
system has only 32MB RAM, the numbers are still the same.
Only processes that have largeaddressspace flag on can benefit from using
/3GB.

To OP:
WinXP 32-bit, is 'licensed' up to 4GB of RAM, no matter how much RAM you
motherboard may support, however, because a lots of last gigabyte is
reserved for PCI, in reality, you may see only somewhat around 3GB when you
install 4GB or more. Using /PAE switch in boot.ini may help a bit, but don't
expect miracles, 3.5GB out of total 4 - is very good.

Are there any limits in the amount of Useable RAM while using Windows
XP Home or Professional?

It's the same for both versions--4GB. That may be more than your
motherboard holds, and is probably more than you can make effective use
of..

Also would using large amounts of RAM cause
conflicts elsewhere, with other hardware (graphics cards etc.)?

No, but to use 4GB of RAM you have to add a switch to a line in the
[Operating Systems] section of boot.ini. Change /fastdetect to /fastdetect
/3GB

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

Sorry Ken, /3GB has nothing to do with physical memory (RAM), it
affects only how virtual address space is split for given process.
(virtual addressable space per process - 4GB (OS 32-bit)).
I.E. no /3GB - 2GB for user mode / 2 GB for kernel. With /3GB - 3GB
user mode / 1GB for kernel.

Doing further research on this, it appears that you are correct. Thanks for
the correction, and my apologies to the OP for the misinformation.

--
Ken Blake - Microsoft MVP Windows: Shell/User
Please reply to the newsgroup

Doesn't matter how much RAM is installed,
even if system has only 32MB RAM, the numbers are still the same.
Only processes that have largeaddressspace flag on can benefit from
using /3GB.

To OP:
WinXP 32-bit, is 'licensed' up to 4GB of RAM, no matter how much RAM
you motherboard may support, however, because a lots of last gigabyte
is reserved for PCI, in reality, you may see only somewhat around 3GB
when you install 4GB or more. Using /PAE switch in boot.ini may help
a bit, but don't expect miracles, 3.5GB out of total 4 - is very good.

Are there any limits in the amount of Useable RAM while using
Windows XP Home or Professional?

It's the same for both versions--4GB. That may be more than your
motherboard holds, and is probably more than you can make effective
use of..

Also would using large amounts of RAM cause
conflicts elsewhere, with other hardware (graphics cards etc.)?

No, but to use 4GB of RAM you have to add a switch to a line in the
[Operating Systems] section of boot.ini. Change /fastdetect to
/fastdetect /3GB