Quote:
recognizing over 3GB of RAM in a Windows XP environment.
To clarify: In 32-bit Windows XP SP2, the OS will only address a maximum of 4Gb physical RAM. However, some of this address space is reserved for device access (DMA and stuff like that). See this KB article.
This means that on a PC with 4Gb of RAM, with Windows XP SP2, you'll generally only see 3.25Gb or so.
This restriction is removed in Windows XP x64, but I've not had a chance to try it yet.
Which means: don't bother buying 4Gb of RAM if you can get away with 3Gb or 2Gb, unless you're planning on using Windows XP (or 2003) x64.
_________________________
--
roger