XP + 4GB Ram

norbie

norbie

norbie

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I'm sure this has been covered before but I can't search for "XP" as it's too short :(

I have a P5B Deluxe board with 4x1GB RAM.

The BIOS sees 4GB, and so do 64-bit operating systems.

XP32 can only see 2GB. I thought it was possible for it to see 3 or 3.5 at least. I read that I might be able to get more if I use the /3GB switch on the boot.ini file. Are there any advantages/disadvantages of doing this?

Thanks in advance.
 
The BIOS sees the 4GB fine (had to enable a setting in the BIOS for that).

I've just moved from Vista64 which saw 4GB to XP32 and it's only seeing the 2GB.
 
Cob said:
Change the memory remapping option in BIOS to see if it has any effect.
Click to expand...

I just disabled the "memory remap" feature in the BIOS so that the BIOS now shows 3GB instead of 4GB.

XP now sees "2.93GB" instead of 2GB so it's certainly done something!

I don't expect to see the 4GB as I know it's not possible. Is this the best I can get though?
 
256MB Graphics so I can't see what else could be using upto 4GB.

If I set the BIOS option to use the "memory remap" feature, the BIOS sees 4GB, XP sees 2GB.

If I disable that option, the BIOS only sees 3GB, and XP sees 2.93GB.
 
Oh no thats fine, i wasn't sure if you had some kind of silly SLi cards or something...

Hmmmm it might actually sound like your memory is on the out... Tried memtest?
 
i've just installed xp and it sees 3.5gb of my 4gb. :p

97f2fbb0c83c2e4e5bf4bf53213da970.png
 
Teki187 said:
Thats not moving to, its downgrading from.
Click to expand...



Interesting, what performance increases have you had?
Most of my framerates etc dropped a few %.
They should be at least 2x to be called an upgrade.

Can you confirm that it is in fact 2x the speed?


BTW, MArc2003's screenie is how it SHOULD look in a 3bit OS.
 
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norbie said:
No, trust me, it's upgrading! :p

There aren't any problems with the RAM, it might just be configuration.
Click to expand...

Explain please how going from a Vista to XP is upgrading? Vista has everything XP has and more.

thegoonden said:
Interesting, what performance increases have you had?
Most of my framerates etc dropped a few %.
They should be at least 2x to be called an upgrade.

Can you confirm that it is in fact 2x the speed?
Click to expand...

I've had faster loading times on games, applications, boot up, better performance management when using multiple applications and so on.

My FPS hasn't changed. I have a XP hard drive and a vista one, same games on both, same video drivers etc etc and there is VERY little difference in performance, sometimes vista is faster sometimes xp is.

For me, its more then 2x the speed, its about 10x the speed.

I don't understand people who say XP is better, there either easily influenced by "cool" people or they just lack the knowledge on how to use a operating system properly.
 
I gave Vista a go - when I first installed it I liked it, especially knowing it was 64-bit and making the full potential of my 4GB ram.

It slowly went down in my opinion for the following reasons:

- Wireless would randomly drop out whenever playing a Steam game. Vista would just make the connection crash. This doesn't happen on XP. Maybe driver related, but I used 2 adaptors. More like something in the OS.

- Alt-tabbing out of a Steam game to the desktop then back again would completely screw up the graphics, and I'd have to restart the game as it would be unplayable. Again, this doesn't happen on XP.

- File copying on Vista even with SP1 was unbelieveably slow! I cannot deal with waiting 1 minute to delete a desktop shortcut!

- I even ran Vista SP1 in performance mode with all graphics effects disabled and it just felt like a complete dog. XP runs so much faster - I love it. I cannot believe that there is anything you can do in Vista that you can't do in XP faster.

With SP3 out, I created a slipstreamed CD to save having to install hundreds of updates and my PC runs fast again. :cool:
 
Wow....

Mine and countless other peoples Vista experiences have been positive.

Not one driver problem, games run almost as good XP, and normal desktop use feels faster.

Indeed, even something something simple like search the hard drive or loading up Photoshop is much faster (XP32 and Vista 64).

Specs are:

Q6600 G0 @ 3.1
4GB OCZ REaper
8800 GTS
 
Are you using 4x1GB or 2x2GB DIMMs?

When I had 2x2GB I saw something like 3.5GB, but now I've got 4x1GB I'm seeing 3GB in WIndows XP. Tried Windows XP 64-bit and saw the full amount.
 
but thats the thing.......games run almost as fast as xp.....cpu intensive games usually run a fair bit slower as vista is busy doing its own stuff and doesnt want to play your game.
fps games online need that cpu power which vista is playing with as higher fps mean smoother frame rates which = easier headshots.

there are other things such as companys not having their drivers all working for vista even though that isnt the fault of vista it does add to the experience.

also some programs may not work on vista....again not the fault of vista but it does add to the experience.

as long as there isnt too much junk installed on xp then its very quick....very reliable and gets the job done.

ofcourse vista is the future but some of us are waiting for the future to catch upto the past.

disclaimer ...no vista operating systems were hurt during the typing of this post
 
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I have to admit, I hated vista to start off with... I thought it looked pretty, but other than that I didn't really like it. Even the start menu angered me.

Now the thought of going back to XP makes me sad (especially since I am using XP at work).

I love the new security, the totally reworked networking and sound techs, the way the GPU actually helps in Vista to draw the desktop is awesome too :p
 
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