4GB On XP32

[brendano257]

Alright my set-up is: XFX 780i, E8400 stock, Corsair 750TX, And two EVGA 8800GTs at 700/960 core/mem. I just upgraded to four sticks of Corsair XMS2 DDR2 @800mhz, 4-4-4-12. I know XP32 can only see a certain amount because of the 32 bit interface. I had 4 gigs for a while on Vista 32bit and did see up to 3.25, but XP will only see 2.5GB, is this a limitation of XP or do they need to be put in a certain configuration, I've labled the sticks 1,2,3,4. 1 and 3 are one pair, 2 and 4 are the other pair as ordered. I've tried several configurations of order, but nothing has yielded more than 2.5GB is there any way to get more to be recognized without trying all combinations. (I think there are 16, but definitely over 10 of them.)

Thanks for any help in advance.

 

[Shadow703793]

Your RAM is being reserved by the SLI.

 

[brendano257]

Your RAM is being reserved by the SLI.

Is there any BIOS settings, or is it better off with the SLI being in control of the extra 1.5GB?

 

[billin30]

I have the same cards in SLI and windows shows the same 2.5 GB of memory. You can either just deal with it since your computer will still be fast, or get vista x64. My computer works just fine and I am waiting for windows 7. Thought about vista for a while til i heard about windows 7. By the time that comes out, I can upgrade a few things on the rig.

 

[Scotteq]

Is there any BIOS settings, or is it better off with the SLI being in control of the extra 1.5GB?

The answer is 'No'.

The problem isn't a physical one - It's that your operating system does not have enough address space - (2 bytes to the 32nd power = 4GB) - to provide for all the physical resource on your computer. System Bios, Motherboard resources, Communications, PCi devices, and Memory mapped I/O all get their share of addresses first. RAM gets what's left over.

Why can't memory be addressed first so it can all be used? Because if your device doesn't get an address, then the OS can't communicate to it and therefore it does not work. If (some portion of) RAM doesn't get the addresses, then you simply show less memory in an otherwise fully functional computer.


The answer to your problem is very simple: Change to a 64 bit operating system, current consumer versions of which have 64 Gigabytes (basic) or 128 GB (Premium/Business/Ultimate)[/i] worth of address space available. Once that's done, you'll again have more addresses than devices, and therefore your OS will be able to run it all.

 

[brendano257]

Thank you, but the one thing I was avoiding was an OS change because I would rather not change before Windows 7, because I was not satisfied with Vista 32 at all, and will not spend the money for Vista 64 given there is little difference for spending ~$200 for an operating system I know I do not like. But thanks for the help.

 

[Scotteq]

Thank you, but the one thing I was avoiding was an OS change because I would rather not change before Windows 7, because I was not satisfied with Vista 32 at all, and will not spend the money for Vista 64 given there is little difference for spending ~$200 for an operating system I know I do not like. But thanks for the help.

< shrug > All I did was tell you why you have your current issue and what you need to do to fix it. You could see about XP64, if you want.

 

[omnimodis78]

I certainly don't mean to hijack this post, but i need to know something related to this issue. I am also running xp32, and looking at upgrading to 4gb from the current 3gb. Basically, I just want to run in dual-channel (i know it's pointless, but I need to satisfy my OCD), but my questions are: 1. Even it's only recognizing 2.75gb single channel (that is what it's seeing now), will upgrading to 4gb change to dual-channel? 2. Will putting it the extra ram degrade (to whatever mathematical degree) the system performance? 3. What are the drawbacks of going to 4gb ram with xp32 (if any?). Thanks.

 

[Shadow703793]

^ Ad long as you have identical speed RAM Dual Channel will work. AFAIK there'arn't any draw backs with going 4GB on XP 32.