4GB of RAM & a 32-Bit OS

[Irksome]

Alright I'll be as consice as possible:

I have 4 sticks of 1GB memory modules.
- 2 of them are made by the same company.
- 2 of them are made by two seperate companies.
- All 4 of them are the same in terms of speed, and etc.
- I have 32-bit Windows XP Pro.
- My mobo supports dual channel, and upwards of 16GB of memory.

My question is, does having 4GB in a 32-Bit system decrease performance as compared to just having 2GB?

 

[giant384]

no it doesnt but the 32bit operating system limits you to using only 3gbs. well alittle more then that but im not sure the exact number.

 

[Beerdude26]

I got 4GB of RAM in my 32-bit XP Pro and it only shows up as 2.75 GB D:

 

[DreamThrall]

Yup, 32-bit operating systems can only address a certain number of bytes of memory. Some of that is taken up by hardware like Video cards, so if you have dual 768 MB video cards in SLI, you can subtract 1536 from your maximum addressable RAM. That ceiling is effectively removed if you use a 64 bit OS.

 

[Asus]

It's possible 4x1GB of mismatched RAM would work together as easily as 2 sticks matched but that isn't always the case. Put them in and find out. They will run with the speed and latency of the slowest stick. Should run in dual channel fine.

Go ahead and try the 4 sticks and hope the PC speaker doesn't beep at you. Assuming the speed isn't much slower than with just the 2GB paired sticks then you might get some benefit out of them.

The limitation is 4 GBs (practically 3.1 GB) of virtual addressing space, Divided with 2 for the OS and 2 for (each) applications. You can switch it to 1 for OS and 3 app but that isn't how it is by default.

If your motherboard has a limitation that is for Physical RAM. Might as well not put in extra then.