Should I go for it?

Wait what :confused: Vista 32bit doesn't support 4gb ram? Does that mean I wasted money?
Correct. Vista 32-bit should not have problems with having 4GB of memory there. But it will not utilize the extra GB. Unfortionatly, you did pay for an unusable GB of ram in this case :( Your motherboard will recognize it, and vista may recognize that it is there, but it will not use it.

NOTE: I am not sure about this statement, but I have heard having more than 3GB of ram in the system can cause problems. Not in all cases, but some. I have used Vista Ultimate 64-bit from the get go so I have not experienced the issue first hand.
 
so if i do get 64bit vista, it will utilize the full 4gb ram?
Meh, good thing the 4gb ram was only about 65bucks. =)

One more question, what's the difference between vista 32 bit/64bit?
 
so it seems 64bit could potentially have a bunch of problems with 32bit programs and could run slower?
Also seems to be a lack of drivers for 64bit which could make things a problem? So I wasted money on 4gb ram... boo =(
 
I would disagree with that. If your hardware is new, and supports 64-bit, then it is very likely to support vista 64-bit. I have a system over 2 years old and all my drivers successfully installed and the system runs problem free. You can always check with the manufacture to be 100% sure your hardware has vista 64-bit drivers.
 
to have a total of 8GB? I assume you are running 64-bit Vista, because the 32-bit version cannot support more than 3GB. :)

a 32 bit OS can recognize more than 3GBs RAM, actually, it recognizes all 4 GBs, it just allocates certain amounts of it to other places, it depends on your system specs (how big your video card is, if you have a sound card, etc...) this is a quote from another board...

"A 32 bit OS is limited to 4GB of address space, from which GPU Vram and IRQ addresses are subtracted from...If you have a 512mb card, chances are XP will see around 3.25GB. And there's a distinct performance increase between 2GB and 3.2GB or so in certain games."

if you have a sound card, a good test to see this is note how much memory you seem to have with it installed (let's say 3.25GBs), then reboot without the card installed, your memory should increase slightly...

so no, that memory doesn't go to waste and 3.25GBs or so is better than 2GBs...

in XP or Vista, a 32bit OS has the same limitations...
 
I am not calling you wrong wol-va-rine, but the memory reserved for hardware components is not shown in the system information on XP or vista, if I remember correctly that is.

The reason 32-bit will not support more than 4GB is because the 32-bit processor is only able to recognizes there to be a certain number of spaces available for addressing (memory addresses)


Is anyone albe to genuinely second this information? I want to make sure what advice I am giving is accurate. I use to know a place that gave a really good explanation and had a chart of what supported what, but I can't find it now :(
 
So I guess I might as well go with 64-bit to avoid any problems. Hopefully it all works out.
 
So I guess I might as well go with 64-bit to avoid any problems. Hopefully it all works out.
I would recommend that. I own Vista Ultimate 64 and I have no problems finding drivers for the hardware and have only found a few programs that will not work with the 64-bit version.

I did talk with some friends over the weekend and they told me that you do need 64-bit edition to utilize all 4GB.
 
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