ATI Radeon HD 4350 RAM Question

[gups]

Hi guys - I recently bought a Dell Vostro 420 (XP Pro) with an ATI Radeon HD4350 512MB PCIe x16 Video Card. From what I understand, this should have 512MB of onboard VRAM.

However, when I open Catalyst Control Center and look under Graphics Hardware in the Information Center, the Memory Size says: "1024MB", while the Memory Type says: "HyperMemory"

Here's what System Information tells me about the Adapter:

Is this the wrong graphics card, or am I missing something here?

Thanks for any help with this!

Name ATI Radeon HD 4300/4500 Series
PNP Device ID PCI\VEN_1002&DEV_954F&SUBSYS_904E1028&REV_00\4&399D3C6A&0&0008
Adapter Type ATI Radeon Graphics Processor (0x954F), ATI Technologies Inc. compatible
Adapter Description ATI Radeon HD 4300/4500 Series
Adapter RAM 1.00 GB (1,073,741,824 bytes)
Installed Drivers ati2dvag.dll
Driver Version 6.14.10.7050
INF File oem21.inf (ati2mtag_R7X section)
Color Planes 1
Color Table Entries 4294967296
Resolution 1680 x 1050 x 60 hertz
Bits/Pixel 32
Memory Address 0xD0000000-0xDFFFFFFF
Memory Address 0xFE9F0000-0xFE9FFFFF
I/O Port 0x0000C000-0x0000CFFF
IRQ Channel IRQ 16
I/O Port 0x000003B0-0x000003BB
I/O Port 0x000003C0-0x000003DF
Memory Address 0xA0000-0xBFFFF
Driver c:\windows\system32\drivers\ati2mtag.sys (6.14.10.7050, 4.39 MB (4,605,952 bytes), 11/13/2009 3:55 AM)

 

[dougie_boy]

it means that the ATI card can use your free RAM aswell as the onboard stuff. its common in low end GPUs.

 

[gups]

Thanks for the response, dougie_boy.

Does that mean that the card, by default, ALWAYS uses 1024MB or will only do so when the need arises? I am not a gamer and don't use any high end graphics apps. I plan on adding another ATI 4350 512MB card to an available PCIe x1 slot (I only have one PCIe x16 slot, which is being taken up by the current card). I have 3GB of RAM installed on this system (32-bit Windows XP Pro), and would like the graphics cards to use as little of the system RAM as possible... Is there any way to disable it from using more than the onboard 512MB?

Thx!

it means that the ATI card can use your free RAM as well as the onboard stuff. its common in low end GPUs.

 

[gups]

Also, I installed CPU-Z to check on the graphics adapter details. When I check the Graphics tab under the "Display Device Selection," it shows two entries. One entry says "Radeon HD 4350" and under Memory Size it says "512MB." But there is another entry, which says "ATI Radeon HD 4300/4500 Series" and under the memory size of that one, it says "1024MB."

I only have one graphics adapter currently. I find it strange that CPU-Z shows two entries...

 

[dougie_boy]

im not sure exactly how it works out and what means what but i think you can disable hyper memory in the catalyst control panel. if youre not using any high GPU intensive programs im not sure it would use the ram tho...

 

[gups]

Thanks again, dougie_boy. I looked in the Catalyst Control Panel, and there doesn't seem to be a way to disable hypermemory...

Also, what do you make of the two separate entries in CPU-Z?

im not sure exactly how it works out and what means what but i think you can disable hyper memory in the catalyst control panel. if youre not using any high GPU intensive programs im not sure it would use the ram tho...

 

[gups]

I just ran GPU-Z, and here's the output. I guess, it does show that it's a 512MB card. I am just wondering why that information does not show up in System Information or under the Adapter tab in Control Panel-Display-Settings-Advanced, or for that matter in the CCC!

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Card Name: ATI Radeon HD 4300/4500 Series
Owner: Submitted: 2010-02-24 21:50:23
Owner's Comments:
GPU: RV710 Revision:
Technology: 55 nm Die Size: 73 mm²
BIOS Version: VER011.017.000.015.033511 Device ID: 1002 - 954F
Bus Interface: PCI-E 2.0 x16 @ x16 Subvendor: Dell (1028)
ROPs: 4 Shaders: 80 (DX 10.1)
Pixel Fillrate: 2.4 GPixel/s Texture Fillrate: 4.8 GTexel/s
Memory Type: DDR2 Bus Width: 64 bit
Memory Size: 512 MB Bandwidth: 6.4 GB/s
Driver: ati2mtag 6.14.10.7050 (Catalyst 10.2) / XP
GPU Clock: 600 MHz 400 MHz
Default Clock: 600 MHz 400 MHz
Overclock: - -
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

So, from the GPU-Z readout it looks like this is a 512MB with an extra 512MB of "hypermemory" enabled. I am pretty sure I don't want or need the extra 512MB. Is there any way to disable HyperMemory? I looked under BIOS settings and under the CCC settings, but did not see any option to do so.

Also, I understand that a 32-bit OS can only address 4GB of total system RAM. Right now, I have 3GB of RAM on my system. With this card installed, my system (under Task Manager-Performance-Physical Memory) does indeed recognize all 3GB of RAM.

I was thinking of adding this card on the PCIe x1 lane to get quad monitor support.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814161280

I don't think this card has hypermemory. If I add this card, will I see a decrease in my usable RAM?

 

[dougie_boy]

the 3gb limit to memory includes the video memory, its still ram and it still needs an address. lucky for you 32bit windows can actually address about 3454mb so youre not losing that much at the moment.

http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2007/03/dude-wheres-my-4-gigabytes-of-ram.html

http://blogs.zdnet.com/hardware/?p=3124

64bit OS have been around for a while now and i would recommend the move, the sooner you make the jump the less painful later. what your putting off now will just haunt you when you try to open large files currently.

if you have a retail copy of windows 7 then you should have both versions available, i would recommend you install it. its a nice stable, secure OS and if you are not using it already then you should try it. its not too expensive.

the only other option for 4 monitors would be to get a matrox triplehead2go adaptor, but that would be much more expensive than the previous solution.

something else to bare in mind, ATI are releasing a series of cards with 6 display ports. might be worth thinging about....

 

[gups]

Thanks, dougie_boy.

MY Vostro 420 came pre-loaded with a 32-bit OS (OEM Version - XP Pro with optional upgrade to 32-bit Win 7 Pro) and I don't believe Microsoft provided any 64-bit installation media with my system.

Also, my system has a mere 350W PSU, so I am limited in terms of the cards that I can add to my system. I am not a gamer and don't have any robust graphic needs. All I need is multi-monitor support. The low power HIS H435F512EP Radeon HD 4350 512MB 64-bit DDR2 PCI Express x1 fits my needs perfectly as a second video card. I don't think my PSU could handle anything more than that anyways. And since my original card (on the PCIe x16 slot) is an ATI 4350 chipset, this card is pretty much the only one I could find which would fit into a PCIe x1 slot and not have any driver issues.

I just added the second card (HIS H435F512EP) and it seems to work fine. CCC shows this card as using only 512MB with no additional "HyperMemory"). Strangely, when I checked the available memory in Task Manager, it only shows 2gb remaining! It was 3gb before I added this card! Any idea what may be going on?

the 3gb limit to memory includes the video memory, its still ram and it still needs an address. lucky for you 32bit windows can actually address about 3454mb so youre not losing that much at the moment.

http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2007/03/dude-wheres-my-4-gigabytes-of-ram.html

http://blogs.zdnet.com/hardware/?p=3124

64bit OS have been around for a while now and i would recommend the move, the sooner you make the jump the less painful later. what your putting off now will just haunt you when you try to open large files currently.

if you have a retail copy of windows 7 then you should have both versions available, i would recommend you install it. its a nice stable, secure OS and if you are not using it already then you should try it. its not too expensive.

the only other option for 4 monitors would be to get a matrox triplehead2go adaptor, but that would be much more expensive than the previous solution.

something else to bare in mind, ATI are releasing a series of cards with 6 display ports. might be worth thinging about....

 

[dougie_boy]

Thanks, dougie_boy.

MY Vostro 420 came pre-loaded with a 32-bit OS (OEM Version - XP Pro with optional upgrade to 32-bit Win 7 Pro) and I don't believe Microsoft provided any 64-bit installation media with my system.

Also, my system has a mere 350W PSU, so I am limited in terms of the cards that I can add to my system. I am not a gamer and don't have any robust graphic needs. All I need is multi-monitor support. The low power HIS H435F512EP Radeon HD 4350 512MB 64-bit DDR2 PCI Express x1 fits my needs perfectly as a second video card. I don't think my PSU could handle anything more than that anyways. And since my original card (on the PCIe x16 slot) is an ATI 4350 chipset, this card is pretty much the only one I could find which would fit into a PCIe x1 slot and not have any driver issues.

I just added the second card (HIS H435F512EP) and it seems to work fine. CCC shows this card as using only 512MB with no additional "HyperMemory"). Strangely, when I checked the available memory in Task Manager, it only shows 2gb remaining! It was 3gb before I added this card! Any idea what may be going on?

as i mentioned before, because windows cant address more than a fixed amount of memory the GPU memory will count against your system memory.

so the two 512mb cards will eat 1gb of your 3gb allowance leaving you with only 2gb left for system RAM.

i think your windows key for windows 7 will work on both 64bit and 32bit versions, so if you can find a friend or colleague with the 64bit version you should be able to use your product code and viola!

back up everything and install a fresh OS and enjoy all the ram you paid for.