Cheap Upgrade- PCI Ram extension

**♔DARTH LEGO♔** · March 16, 2011, 05:03 AM

Just want a bit of information as my local PC store guy is little more than glorified cashier and is no help.

I have the 32-bit Win Xp.

Now by all intents and purposes its 3GIG RAM max, ok.... my question is this.

If i had to buy a PCI Ram expansion board and load it up with lets say 4x1GIG chips and massively extend my ram, could i possibly activate the RAM through LAA or some other means??

or

Are the limitations on Win32 bit XP just something i have to live with until i can upgrade properly??

**Doono** · March 16, 2011, 08:12 AM

32 bit operating systems are physically limited to 4GB of memory, no matter when you do you can't physically address more than 4GB, a 64 bit operating system is required.

**Ishan** · March 16, 2011, 09:26 AM

Originally Posted by Doono

32 bit operating systems are physically limited to 4GB of memory

3.5GB afaik.

**Doono** · March 16, 2011, 12:52 PM

Originally Posted by Ishan

3.5GB afaik.

Thats a limitation imposed by windows, 32 bit can theoretically support 4GB

**karamazovmm** · March 16, 2011, 10:34 AM

you have to understand that 32 bit programs are restricted to the amount of memory they use, as 64 bit as well. So no you are only going to waste money.

**mp0295** · March 16, 2011, 09:18 PM

What even is a "PCI Ram expansion board"

**irishron** · March 16, 2011, 09:59 PM

They've been around since the old 8086 days.

They are a card you can add more ram to, in this case probably DDR2, to get by the Max memory the board is made for. If his board says 4gb max, this is a way to circumvent it.

**iPwntUrMum** · March 16, 2011, 10:26 PM

To summarize what they^ said:
No.
It's not your hardware, but the operating system itself.

Nowadays, for almost every new build, you'll want a 64 bit os.

Cheers