Does Win 7 fix the 4GB RAM problem in Vista?

If you switch to W7 or Vista 64 bit, it will recognize 4GB+ of ram. 32 bit will only recognize up to 3.5GB.

Yeah, the 4GB "problem" isn't a "Vista" issue, it's a 32-bit issue. A 64-bit OS (XP, Vista or Windows 7) will be able to access more than 4GB of memory.

okay, awesome

you can have up to 16 GB of memory in Windows Vista/7 x64
i believe its even higher (128?) in Windows Ultimate

Home Premium - 16GB
Pro / Ultimate / Enterprise - 192GB

so i was close

nearly all wrong, you can actualy use upto 64GB ram in Vista by copying the memory managment part from an activated install of Win2k8 server, as described here

presumably all other Win versions can also use upto 64GB

I'm referring to what MS officially supports... not unsupported hacks. Besides, why waste your time with 32-bit workarounds when 64-bit is quickly becoming the standard? Secondly, no home user is going to be able to make use of more than 16GB of RAM anyway. Thirdly, finding drivers that are "large address aware" is extremely difficult.

well i could say i disagree but i'd be wrong because i actually agree, so well said

BTW: i'm currently using a 32 bit vista so hacks official or unofficial are usefull to me and probably many other users

hacking a 32-bit system to run w/ more RAM is kinda inefficient doe to inherited limitations of the technology

inefficiet, how ? - 64GB is very much overkill but it's better than 3GB ish by default, and as Zoren said

By the time the next MS OS rolls out, I'm predicting that 64-bit will be the standard with a few 32-bit holdouts. If MS decides that it's next OS will be 64-bit only, then that pretty much signals the end of the 32-bit OS. After all, 64-bit Windows is still fully capable of running 32-bit programs... so continuing to offer both won't make a lot of sense... especially when more 64-bit apps start hitting the market.

the only issue w/ x64 are some legacy devices and software that are 16-bit that won't run on a x64 machine...
i personally don't think i've run software/ used hardware that old in a long time

As many have said; it's the 32-bit limitation of 4 GB in windows; I'm writing on a 64-bit Win pro OS, here; This system has 8GB; it happenes that the manufactureer used DDR3 RAM to fill in the open slots of 2 GB each (4X2); it will take 4 GB each slot but that is DDR3 RAM; the expense of DDR3 now exceeds the cost of this system; before I execute that I want to find a place to park the DDR3 4X2 modules before buying 4X4 GB RAM modules just to get 16GB total RAM for this system; with 8GB and my usage isn't finding virtual usage exceeding 8 GB for my work. It's nice not to be bounded by 4 GB as in XP 32-bit; I have established a VM with XP to run a necessary 32-bit Outlook 2003 address database. Setting up the Virtual Machine is a work in progress for me. I appreciate having the freedom of RAM that seems like limitless boundaries when I can go beyond 4 GB and have multiple cores to apply to apps; it is so nice not to have hanging apps due to RAM limitations.

One thing is besure your browser is a 64-bit capable model. Found that Firefox iteration I was using was not and spent a weekend having browser hangs; discovered a Naka something iteration of Firefox that was a Win7-ok version and that solved the hanging problem, that required re-booting each time...whew...what a pain that was.

what on earth do you do that you need 16 GB of RAM?
that just seems like allot unless your doing some HD video editing or something

Necro post detected. Closing thread.