Just curious from my own point of view - will Win XP 32 bit be able to use 3 gigs of RAM? I must qualify this question by pointing out that I am a complete computer ignoramus.

Just curious from my own point of view - will Win XP 32 bit be able to use 3 gigs of RAM? I must qualify this question by pointing out that I am a complete computer ignoramus.

Your right. Windows XP 32bit will use up to 3,25 GB RAM. But it's allways better to have 2 or 4 GB for the stability. Windows seems to work better with 2 or 4 GB instead of 3 GB.

Windows seems to work better with 2 or 4 GB instead of 3 GB.

Really that's weird, why's that out of curiosity?

Hello AllI have just installed the two new ram sticks (3200-400 five minutes ago) I have to say I am seriously underwhelmed ,if my PC started up any quicker then I couldn't see it, likewise FS2004 seemed to take just as long to startup as it always has..Any ways have yet to try a flight in FS2004 ,will see if I can detect any improvement in performance.(maybe try from EGLL ,or KLAX or suchlike as these are performance hoggers ) Anyway ram installed and functioning properly so that's ok. I probably need to calm down a bit before I can make a true judgement. cheers All. Andy

Really that's weird, why's that out of curiosity?

Wewll, someone from my local computer shop told me that windows will work better with an even amount of RAM when in dual channel mode. But maybe he´s wrong with that.

I jump on your question to ask another one: with new operating systems such as Vista and Seven (64 bits), do you think having a lot of RAM is useful for fs9?Today I have 4 GB, is it worth upgrading to 8 GB? RAM is cheap, but is it useful for a 32-bits application like fs9?I wonder... Eric

I jump on your question to ask another one: with new operating systems such as Vista and Seven (64 bits), do you think having a lot of RAM is useful for fs9?Today I have 4 GB, is it worth upgrading to 8 GB? RAM is cheap, but is it useful for a 32-bits application like fs9?I wonder... Eric

Well, my system worked very good with 8GB prior to my Sandy Bridge update. the main reason for diong this was wo deactivate the page file and takeing a bit of stress off my HDD. it somewhoat improved my FSP in FSX and FS9 cause the HDD has only to read now and not to write the page file at the same time. Just my experience.

Interesting. I've always been told removing the page file was "dangerous", even with a lo of RAM, but I'm happy to see it works fine on your system. Indeed, adding RAM to avoid the page file certainly improves the whole system. Eric

Interesting. I've always been told removing the page file was "dangerous", even with a lo of RAM, but I'm happy to see it works fine on your system. Indeed, adding RAM to avoid the page file certainly improves the whole system. Eric

Page file stuff!!Explanation please chaps .some more tweaking perhaps!! "Fs9 your never far from tinker time."Keats 1645

I jump on your question to ask another one: with new operating systems such as Vista and Seven (64 bits), do you think having a lot of RAM is useful for fs9?Today I have 4 GB, is it worth upgrading to 8 GB? RAM is cheap, but is it useful for a 32-bits application like fs9?I wonder... Eric

No - only 64 bit applications can address the extra memory available. FS9 will still only be able to see max 4GB (ie: 2 to the power of 32)

Page file stuff!!Explanation please chaps .some more tweaking perhaps!! "Fs9 your never far from tinker time."Keats 1645

Well, windows shifts a lot of vitual memory from the physical RAM to an vitual RAM on the HDD called Page File when physical RAM ammount is too small. If you now have 8 GB of physical RAM installed, you can force the system not to use the page file on the HDD but use the physical RAM for all kinds of memory operations instead. This helps to reduce the stress on the HDD (no write and write at two different locations on the disc at the same time) and pushes the frame rates up (My experience in FSX) and sometimes less shutters.

No - only 64 bit applications can address the extra memory available. FS9 will still only be able to see max 4GB (ie: 2 to the power of 32)

I don't believe this is exactly correct. It is true that FS9 can only allocate 4 Gb of memory space, but in 64 bit OS FS9 can't directly run. Instead it is run inside of WoW64. WoW64 installs 3 dll files into the FS9 process, and these are special 64 bit programs which control the memory space ABOVE 4Gb on behalf of FS9. This upper memory space is used by the 64 bit OS when doing certain functions for FS9 (in 32 bit windows, these OS functions reside in 2 Gb of the FS9 memory space, unless you make fs9,exe large address space aware and boot with the /3GB switch, which then will squeeze the OS into just 1 Gb of the FS9 memory space.) Microsoft calls the methods used by WoW64 to control 32 bit process memory space as "thunking". This term was coined back in the days when 16 bit programs were being run on 32 bit windows. It isn't quite the same thing, as the 16 bit memory model was based on a 16 bit segment address and 16 bit offset address, so it was easier to convert 16 bit addresses into flat 32 bit addresses. So combining the memory addressing of FS9 (with large address space aware) with the memory addressing of Win x64 on behalf of FS9, it is possible in theory to allocate more than 4 Gb of memory space, and hence reside in RAM, but whether that would ever actually happen when running FS9 I don't know. With 8 Gb of RAM I run a fixed 2Gb page file. I don't know the right answer, but I have never been convinced it's good to disable page file altogether. I figure Win 7 is pretty good about memory management and don't try to second guess it. scott s..

I use a laptop ( Acer 5100 ) to make my flights , so i think the older the system more you will see changes if you upgrade ram. Mine came with 2 x 521 , i took one of them out and put a 2gb , so now i have 2.50 , fs9 and win7 are alo more fluid now.Safe flying!

i run a 3 year old laptop with 1 GB of ram, your pc may not be able to handle above a certain amount, so your best checking with the manufacture. you can get a clear boost in frames by looking up gmebooster V3. in a google search, it de-frags your system within 20-30 seconds and then "boost's" your game by allowing all ram to that one game. its a great application to be using. Ben

i run a 3 year old laptop with 1 GB of ram, your pc may not be able to handle above a certain amount, so your best checking with the manufacture. you can get a clear boost in frames by looking up gmebooster V3. in a google search, it de-frags your system within 20-30 seconds and then "boost's" your game by allowing all ram to that one game. its a great application to be using. Ben

Thanks BenHave been a gamebooster fan for a long time.cheers Andy