I have 6Gb of ram install in my computer using Vista 32 bit. When I right on on my computer and property, it says I have 6 but when i do Dxdiag, it says i only have 3. anyone know why its like that? I also heard that 32 bit OS can only use 3.25 Gb.
[quote=Tech support guidelines][B]My computer shows <amount less than 4GB> of memory, but I have 4GB of memory![/B]
mblunk posted:
32-bit operating systems can have 2^32 "addresses", which are used for input and output to the computer. This can include USB, keyboard buttons, mouse position and clicks, video and system RAM, and so on. 2^32=4294967296, which is the number of bytes in 4GB. System memory gets the last addressing priority, so in 32-bit, you can use as much as ram as 4GB minus your VRAM (video card memory), which is the only other thing that takes up a considerable amount of addresses. However, other addresses may add up and further reduce usable RAM, which usually comes up to an additional .1-.25GB. So if you have a 512MB video card, you can use up to 3.5GB of RAM because 512MB is half a gig, and since system memory gets last address priority, the VRAM (video ram on the graphics card) gets addresses first. If you have a 1GB graphics card, you can use up to 3GB. In 64-bit, you can use up to 17179869184 GB in theory, but 64-bit windows only supports up to 128GB in practice. This is why 64-bit is the future, because the current memory standard is approaching the 32-bit limit for addresses, so people are switching to 64-bit so they can have more memory.
[/quote]
Its in the sticky
32 bit operating systems can only use/recognize about 3.5 or less gigs of ram.
64 can utilize your full 6 gigs
Sorry, you need to Log In to post a reply to this thread.