dave
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join:2000-05-04
not in ohio
 ·Verizon Online DSL
 ·Verizon FIOS
| reply to Duchess44
Re: Windows Vista and RAm
You've got 2GB, which is likely enough. It really depends on what you're doing. I've got a general-purpose Vista system (web, email, office tools) which is just fine with that, INCLUDING the fact that the shared-memory graphics snarfs up some of the RAM.
If you want to buy more, it depends on how many memory slots you have free. Best case, you've got 4 slots and 2 of them each has a 1-GB stick installed. Buy two more 1-GB sticks. So, maybe you won't be able to use the full 4GB, but you'll use as much as you can.
The only reason I can see for sticking at 3GB is that the cost difference is significant for you. And since I haven't looked at memory prices nor your bank statement, I can't be much use there.
Warning: I have met a few cheap motherboards where filling all 4 memory slots results in a flaky system. If that happens to you, your next best step is to consider discarding the memory you have, and buying two 2-GB sticks (assuming your motherboard supports them; use a good memory advisor like the one at Crucial's web site).
But, really, absent any data that says you're hurting for memory, just leave it at 2GB. |
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ztmike
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join:2001-08-02
Michigan City, IN
 ·Comcast
1 edit | He does gaming..
I just looked through the thread and I saw what type of ram you use, this should do ya good
»www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a···20134747
$51 with free shipping for 2 sticks of 2gig ram for a total of 4gigs.
It is a desktop though right? |
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elios
join:2005-11-15
Springfield, MO
·Mediacom
1 edit | the thing is DDR2 is cheaper then air
the price saving from 2x1GB to 2x2GB is very small like 5-10 bucks at most no point in running 4 sicks and slowing your PC down when you have a matched set of likely much faster ram in a 2x2GB setup
»www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a···20231226
heres 4GB and its 1066 and CHEAPER then that 667
like i said DDR2 is insanely cheap no point not get good 1066 |
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ztmike
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join:2001-08-02
Michigan City, IN | He has PC2 5300, you can mix the ram like that? |
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elios
join:2005-11-15
Springfield, MO
·Mediacom
1 edit | 2x2GB wouldnt need too which is kinda the point
why get slower ram for the same or more then you can get faster ram?
this is the same thing i tell every one else that upgrades ram
pull what you have put in 2x2GB of nice DDR2 1066 call it a day the price difference is 0 or some time less if you shop around
in this case the faster 1066 is 5 bucks less then "namebrand" Kingston which is kinda crappy any more imo
OP has a Q6600 which really needs DDR2 800 any way so and im sure the board can run 1066 if you really wanted to but running 1066 lets you run 5-5-5-12 at 800 with lower vdimm |
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Duchess44
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join:2001-10-24
Chattanooga, TN
·Comcast
1 edit | reply to ztmike
said by ztmike  :He does gaming.. I just looked through the thread and I saw what type of ram you use, this should do ya good » www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a···20134747$51 with free shipping for 2 sticks of 2gig ram for a total of 4gigs. It is a desktop though right? Yes, a desktop. So I should just replace the 2gig I already have? And that price is great!
Also, do you guys think I should replace my video card? Or is replacing the memory going to be enough? |
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ztmike
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join:2001-08-02
Michigan City, IN
·Comcast
4 edits | quote:
So I should just replace the 2gig I already have? And that price is great!
I would. More than likely you have a different type of ram brand in there right now. So yea I would replace it, so its all the same.
quote:
Also, do you guys think I should replace my video card? Or is replacing the memory going to be enough
What do you have now? Just onboard? Do you have a PCI-E slot? (CPU-Z, should tell you, under "Mainboard" tab.)
Can't really give you choices when I don't know what type of graphics slot your computer has, or the current PSU wattage your running..I'm guessing stock on that part. |
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ztmike
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Michigan City, IN
·Comcast
| reply to Duchess44
I saw you made a thread in the PC Gaming forum..check my reply in there for a recommendation on what GPU and PSU.
»Looking to upgrade memory and possibly video card |
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elios
join:2005-11-15
Springfield, MO
·Mediacom
| reply to Duchess44
yea
totaly replace what you have now take a look at the ram i linked its cheaper a better brand and MUCH faster and will run at DDR2 800 speeds which your CPU was made for using DDR2 667 on a quad core is a sin go DDR2 800 or better it doesnt cost any more as you can see |
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Duchess44
Premium
join:2001-10-24
Chattanooga, TN
1 edit | reply to ztmike
I have an ATI Radeon HD 2600 PRO. And the wattage is 350W |
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Margolis
Premium
join:2003-11-24
Saint Louis, MO
·Charter Pipeline
| reply to elios
said by elios : FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU did you MISS ALL MY POST IT DOESNT WORK THAT WAY THE RAM ON THE CARD IS NOT MAPPED 1 TO 1 ANY MORE AND HASNT BEEN SINCE MOST CARDS HAD OVER 256MB ON THEM RAGGGEEEE ITS THE SAME IN THAT SWAP FILE IS NOT MAPPED 1 TO 1 WHY IS THIS SO HARD TO UNDERSTAND JUST LOOK AT THE LAST POST I MADE » en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_address_space I saw your post. It is meaningless. 32bit windows can only address 4GB of ram. That includes video ram. we are not talking about virtual memory here, we are talking real ram.
»www.vistaclues.com/reader-questi···s-vista/ |
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dave
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join:2000-05-04
not in ohio
·Verizon Online DSL
·Verizon FIOS
3 edits | You're right. Anything running on the CPU at any instant of time has access to no more than 4GB of physical address space on the system bus.
What you're completely overlooking is that there may be no need for all graphics memory to be accessible from the system bus at the same instant of time.
What is your explanation for how the 4GB video card is possible?
------------------------------
The vistaclues web site is clueless. Here's why.
Here’s the catch: applications have to be written specifically to take advantage of PAE. Utterly, utterly untrue.
Once again, someone can't tell the difference between virtual addressing and physical addressing. Still, the concepts were only invented in 1960, so I guess it's early days yet.
Here's a hint: a plain old Win32 program will execute without modification on a suitable Windows Server platform just fine, even if it finds itself executing above the 4GB physical line.
If you don't understand this, then you have no idea how a memory management unit works, not indeed how processor addressing works, and you ought not to be making such silly statements. |
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elios
join:2005-11-15
Springfield, MO
·Mediacom
| reply to Margolis
vram is not directly addressed its paged with a hole 256 to 512MB in size any other "loss" is do the other stuff in your PC using address space
if it was the case that ram was mapped 1:1
and you had 512MB card you would have less tehn 3.5GB becouse other hardware needs ranges too it would be more like 3.2 or less
the size of the hole is set in BIOS on my system its 256MB + ~128MB for other IO that it uses when i was in XP left me with 3.25GB out of 4GB and this is with 896MB card |
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Margolis
Premium
join:2003-11-24
Saint Louis, MO
·Charter Pipeline
| reply to dave
said by dave : The vistaclues web site is clueless. Here's why. Here’s the catch: applications have to be written specifically to take advantage of PAE. Utterly, utterly untrue. sorry, but you need to do a bit of research. Vistaclues is absolutely correct according to microsoft. Applications have to be written using the Address Windowing Extensions (AWE) application programming interface (api). If they don't, they can't take advantage of PAE. The 4GB video card works because of PAE and the drivers using the correct api. You need to watch what you are calling "silly statements". the fact remains that 32 bit windows has only 4GB of address space, no matter how you slice it. It can be extended in virtual memory with PAE, yes. But by default, PAE is off in windows 32, unless you are are running the Server versions. And that 4GB of address range is all address, not just system.
»www.microsoft.com/whdc/system/pl···mem.mspx
»www.dansdata.com/askdan00015.htm
»msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library···85).aspx |
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Margolis
Premium
join:2003-11-24
Saint Louis, MO
·Charter Pipeline
2 edits | reply to elios
said by elios :vram is not directly addressed its paged with a hole 256 to 512MB in size any other "loss" is do the other stuff in your PC using address space if it was the case that ram was mapped 1:1 and you had 512MB card you would have less tehn 3.5GB becouse other hardware needs ranges too it would be more like 3.2 or less the size of the hole is set in BIOS on my system its 256MB + ~128MB for other IO that it uses when i was in XP left me with 3.25GB out of 4GB and this is with 896MB card vram is mapped just like system memory. windows has limited address space. It does not go by a "hole" as you keep saying. That may have been how agp memory was mapped to virtual space, but not pcie. with a 512mb card and 4GB you would have ~3.5GB usable in most cases. The bios and other things needing address space are insignificant. 32bit windows can access ~4.2GB of memory, minus your your 896MB and assorted others you end up with ~3.2GB, what you see. I boot my computer up in xp 32, with a 1GB video card, it sees 3.1GB system. |
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Tychicus
Children are our most precious resource
Premium
join:2002-01-18
Helena, MT
clubs:
| reply to Duchess44
Duchess in my humble opinion just get as much RAM as your motherboard can handle since RAM is about the cheapest upgrade you can do at this point in time.
Also go to crucials web site and it will auto detect the RAM your motherboard can use here is a link
»www.crucial.com/systemscanner/
I would then go to someplace like newegg and get some which will probably be a lot cheaper however Crucial does warrenty thier stuff.
--
Team Discovery |
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elios
join:2005-11-15
Springfield, MO
·Mediacom
| reply to Margolis
ill post this screen shot AGAIN since you missed it
note the BIGGEST RANGE IS ZOMG 256MB then a 128MB then a few 32MB an 16MB
and then add up to much less then 892MB thats on the card
go look for your self on your 1GB card it wont be using all 1GB becouse thats just bad way to use ram in a32bit system
the GPU has its own memory controler that does its OWN addressing it just has a range in which the CPU can hand off data to
and were did you get this 4.2GB number the hardlimit is 4GB of address space FULL STOP
yes with PAE you can have 36bit addressing
but most consumer drivers dont use it
go look in your device manager your self add up the ranges i be it comes to less then 1GB |
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dave
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join:2000-05-04
not in ohio
·Verizon Online DSL
·Verizon FIOS
2 edits | reply to Margolis
said by Margolis :sorry, but you need to do a bit of research. Sigh, I do this system programming stuff for a living. I have written Windows kernel code. I know how it works.
If the OS supports PAE, applications can be paged into RAM anywhere, without application change. Even above the 4GB line. This sounds awfully like an application "taking advantage" of PAE to me -- its memory accesses naturally are relocated through the PAE mechanisms. Though since "taking advantage" is not a concept defined in the processor reference manual, I suppose there is wiggle room there.
So, statement so far: applications can use physical memory above the 4GB line without modification.
Now, a regular application has access to only its 4GB of virtual address space (of which 2GB [or 3] belongs to it, and 2GB [or 1] holds the OS global address space [depending on /3GB switch]). The 4GB limit on virtual address space naturally imposes a limit on how much RAM can be accessed (but not on where that RAM is located in the physical address space).
An application that wants to access more than 4GB of RAM, despite the limitations of its address space, can use AWE to create a physical-memory-backed section of larger size than it can address, and then remap a window from its address space into the section.
So: an application using AWE can access a total of more than 4GB of memory.
Key distinctions to be made when talking about this:
1) Virtual versus physical.
2) "Above the 4GB line" versus "more than 4GB from one process"
It can be extended in virtual memory with PAE, yes. Nonsense. PAE is Physical Address Extension. It makes physical addresses larger. It does not change virtual addressing at all. PAE only changes the mechanisms the processor uses to translate virtual to physical. Without PAE, page tables deliver 20 bits of page frame number (i.e., 32 bits physical address). With PAE, page tables deliver 24 bits of page frame number (i.e., 36 bits physical address).
But by default, PAE is off in windows 32, unless you are are running the Server versions. Nonsense. PAE is on in my 32-bit XP Pro systems with 2GB RAM.
(The reason PAE is on even in small-memory systems is that you have to have PAE on in order to get no-execute support. The 4GB physical limit in XP is not due to lack of PAE, it is an artificial limit due to Microsoft marketing/support policy).
And that 4GB of address range is all address, not just system. Indeed. But as I keep saying, there is no intrinsic reason why memory on a video board needs to even have an address on the bus, all of the time. It's a matter between a board and the drivers. (I also say I don't know what current implementations actually do). |
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Margolis
Premium
join:2003-11-24
Saint Louis, MO
·Charter Pipeline
| reply to elios
said by elios :the GPU has its own memory controler that does its OWN addressing it just has a range in which the CPU can hand off data to the os has to know where ALL memory it is using is. The video card may have it's own controller. but windows still has it addressed for it to be used.
As for where I got the number;
»en.wikipedia.org/wiki/32-bit
of integer values that can be stored in 32 bits is 0 through 4,294,967,295 |
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Margolis
Premium
join:2003-11-24
Saint Louis, MO
1 edit | reply to dave
1 |
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