[tiroshii]

I know it's a common question (sorry) but I can't really find a decent answer available out there, it is due to the fact I'm only running a 32 bit OS?

Edited by tiroshii, 04 April 2010 - 05:07 PM.

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32 bit OS will only utilize 3 to 3.5 gigs of memory total.
What your pic is showing is 4 gigs total installed but only 2.87gb of usable or free memory.
Being that OS uses 256 megs to itself added to the 2.87 gb would give you a total of 3.1 gb total memory usable.
This falls right in to what the normal would be for a 32 bit OS.
You are fine with what you are showing.

[rshaffer61]

32 bit OS will only utilize 3 to 3.5 gigs of memory total.
What your pic is showing is 4 gigs total installed but only 2.87gb of usable or free memory.
Being that OS uses 256 megs to itself added to the 2.87 gb would give you a total of 3.1 gb total memory usable.
This falls right in to what the normal would be for a 32 bit OS.
You are fine with what you are showing.

[Ferrari]

Yeah, that sounds about right. Especially if this is a prebuilt OEM machine. On my motherboard, I actually had to change some settings in the BIOS for my Video Card/Memory settings before all 3gb was considered "usable"... before that it only said 2.5gb was usable. My machine is Custom.

If this is a custom machine that you built, I have no idea how to tell you where to look in the BIOS to mess with the settings... all BIOS's are different and it was pretty deep in there for mine, so I wouldn't know where to begin.

Edited by Ferrari, 04 April 2010 - 08:14 PM.

[tiroshii]

32 bit OS will only utilize 3 to 3.5 gigs of memory total.
What your pic is showing is 4 gigs total installed but only 2.87gb of usable or free memory.
Being that OS uses 256 megs to itself added to the 2.87 gb would give you a total of 3.1 gb total memory usable.
This falls right in to what the normal would be for a 32 bit OS.
You are fine with what you are showing.

Just as I thought, thanks a lot

Yeah, that sounds about right. Especially if this is a prebuilt OEM machine. On my motherboard, I actually had to change some settings in the BIOS for my Video Card/Memory settings before all 3gb was considered "usable"... before that it only said 2.5gb was usable. My machine is Custom.

If this is a custom machine that you built, I have no idea how to tell you where to look in the BIOS to mess with the settings... all BIOS's are different and it was pretty deep in there for mine, so I wouldn't know where to begin.

this is a prebuilt laptop. my custom desktop is fine.

[peter99]

desktop PC with on board VGA

just some info for people about shared memory in BIOS

in the top part of picture

shared memory as low as i could go 16mb

lower part is

max shared memory 256mb

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