Problem installing RAM

I thought maybe it was my BIOS since it was using a version from 2006, so I upgraded that to the latest, but it's still reading 2.93GBs.
 
I don't think you have a problem. It's probably that your system has reserved the rest of the address space for devices instead of RAM. Does the POST screen show 4294967296 bytes?
 
I checked several times and it doesnt say, unless its part the scrolling at the end where I can't catch anything.

If it has reserved spaces for devices, shouldn't it have said .93Gbs before I installed and not 2GBs?
 
Right when your computer boots up keep pressing F1, F2 or the Delete key. It will get you into BIOS where you can physically check how much memory you have installed.
 
When bios says available or usable that is usually how much ram you can address without enabling remapping. And remapping will not do you any good as long as you're running 32bit xp.
 
Run CPU-Z and tell us what is says.
cpuznr8.jpg


I guess this means its working?
 
If it has reserved spaces for devices, shouldn't it have said .93Gbs before I installed and not 2GBs?

I don't really understand what you are asking. If you have less than 2.93GB of RAM your system will be able to address all of it. You only had 2GB before and adding the additional 2GB put you over the 'limit.'
 
I don't really understand what you are asking. If you have less than 2.93GB of RAM your system will be able to address all of it. You only had 2GB before and adding the additional 2GB put you over the 'limit.'

I don't really know what im asking myself. I really don't know too much about computer hardware. I just expected 2GB + 2GB = 4GB, not 2GB+2GB=2.93GB.
 
I don't really know what im asking myself. I really don't know too much about computer hardware. I just expected 2GB + 2GB = 4GB, not 2GB+2GB=2.93GB.

And it does = 4GB but the problem is the upper range of addresses are taken by things that aren't your system's RAM. You have 4GB but unless you move to a 64bit OS, your system wont be able to address it all.
 
Okay, that makes sense. I upgraded my video card and it went from 2.93 to 2.43, so I'm assuming my new card uses up more ram than my last one?
 
I'm thinking about upgrading to vista, so to make the most out of my memory, I should get the x64 version? Are there any compatibility problems, etc? Would I need to reinstall all my programs? Are there any noticable differences from the 32bit version to a casual user?
 
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