My dumb Vista question

Superman · Post by **Superman** » 2008-05-15 10:04pm

Some editions are 32, and some are 64. What do those numbers actually mean?

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2008-05-15 10:27pm

Those numbers refer to the 32-bit or 64-bit editions of Vista. The former is more compatible but limits you to 4GB of RAM; the latter requires somewhat newer processors, is less compatible with some older software but lets you have pretty much as much RAM as you could possibly want.

Jaevric · Post by **Jaevric** » 2008-05-16 11:34am

My understanding is that Vista 32 (or XP 32 for that matter) will recognize a maximum of 4 gig of RAM and will further decrease this amount based on your video card's ram. For example, XP 32 and Vista 32 only showed my system as having 2.35 gig of RAM (prior to the latest patch, which caused Vista to display all 4 gigs even if it didn't use it).

Vista 64 runs very well on my system with 4 gig of RAM, though I admit I've considered bumping it up to 8 gig just for the hell of it.