2 OR 4 GIGS

[wnb]

The wife keeps on asking me what i want for xmas and i can not really think of anything. The only thing I can think of is doubling my memory from 2 gig to 4 gig of memory. But I get the feeling from these forums that 4 gig is wasted on vista.

i thought something like http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MY-087-OC would go well with my pc and keep my existing memory for a media pc i'm wanting to build.

 

[Admiral Huddy]

I found 4GB very speedy on Vista.. but you'll only get the full use of it on Vista 64.

the “4GB” maximum memory limit of 32-bit Windows is purely theoretical. In practice, the max memory is something significantly less, equal to 4GB minus your video card memory and the address space allocated to a couple other hardware resourcse. Typically, the realistic maximum memory is somewhere betwee 2.5GB and 3.5GB.
Unfortunately, a lot of people are discovering this AFTER they pay for 4GB of RAM. For the record, this limitation has always been there, including in Windows XP and earlier versions of Windows. However, nowadays, more computer hardware is designed to support 4GB or more of RAM, and memory is getting cheap enough that more people can afford the full 4GB.

Stick it in anyway.. It's so cheap. You'll get use of the 3.2GB and you'll be ready should you choose to go 64-bit later.