Quote:
Originally Posted by Matt L
Unless your computer is more than 10 years old, yes I am sure. The technology is called PAE, Physical Address Extension, and it's been supported for a long time.
You'll also see all of your memory with 32-bit WS2003 (if you pay enough).
I don't recall if WS2008-RTM (Vista kernel) has a 32-bit build, but I do know that WS2008-R2 (Windows 7 kernel) does not.
Of course, Windows Server costs a lot more than the client versions, and especially if you want to use huge amounts of memory. They sell multiple versions, with varying RAM (and other) limits, for varying prices. All marketing, mind you; there is no technical reason that you can't use 64G on a 32-bit PAE system (it has 36-bit physical address space).
For details, see this document:
http://download.intel.com/design/processor/manuals/253665.pdf
Edited to add: You're likely seeing less than 3.5G because your video card is using main RAM. |
I own high-end Dell servers ($10K new) they support PAE. I still never see more than 2.75 GB in any MS 32-bit OS, regardless of video.
But I run 64-bit and use 8 to 16 GB RAM. I had not noticed what was available when I installed Mandriva 32-bit. I'll try it, or maybe I'll just try a live 32-bit ubuntu and see what is available.
I'll let you know what I find.