RAM in Vista's Task Manager vs BIOS (not another 4gb thread)

**gojcaj** · 07-11-2008

I currently own a Vaio FZ-190 (notebook) which had a single 1GB DDR2 5300 memory card. Earlier I installed a matching 2GB card in the other slot and can't seem to figure out what is going on. The BIOS, MSINFO32, and CPU-Z all show 3GB RAM installed but only 1.00 GB Total Physical Memory available. I know some memory is allocated for the video card and other things but these numbers seem too far off. On the other hand, CPU usage seems to have gone way down. Vista Home Premium and SP1 is installed. I've been searching all over for a solution but I can't find a solid answer. I even tried to edit the msconfig boot.ini maximum memory but it just resets to 1024. I took out the original 1GB Card and had just the 2GB inside but Task Manager remained the same while MSINFO32 and BIOS updated. I also ran a registry sweeper and unplugged the laptop & battery for over an hour. Does anyone have any idea what I should do?

Thank you for your time.

**SergioSantos** · 07-11-2008

Have a look on these threads. That might help you to solve your problem !!

Total Physical Memory on Task Manager shows wrong value?

4gb showing in Sys Info but only 2gb showing in Task Manager

**gojcaj** · 07-11-2008

Although the problem is similar, I don't think those apply to me as I've read over them before. Those deal with someone having 4GB of RAM on a 32-Bit System. My laptop can't be allocating 2 whole gigabytes to other hardware. Thank you for the help though.

**Baltazar** · 08-11-2008

Are you running a SLI graphics configuration alongside a 32bit Vista OS by any chance? Most 32 bit Vista OS only report around 2 GB of ram due to an issue with addressing in 32 bit. A 64 bit OS will show the full 3GB.

Further to this a SLI configuration also removes an amount of ram equivalent to that of both cards. So if you have 2 x 256MB cards you will also lose a further 512MB.

Therefore in Vista theres the potential of you only theoretically having 1-2GB showing with 3GB and above installed.

**gygabite** · 08-11-2008

Are you sure you dont have shared video memory. I had a similar problem and it turned out 1GB was being used for video memory. I think windows xp was supposed to have this problem and can only work with under 3GB of ram but vista should be fine.

**Sebastian.j** · 08-11-2008

It's how windows Vista reads ram. You more than likely have other components with memory in them. Say graphics cards that are about 512 or 1gb. Pretty much subtract that number by how much ram you have and you get the number it shows.

Fortunately there is nothing wrong with your system. If you get all the latest updates of Vista it will show the correct amount. I believe they fixed it in SP1.

**gojcaj** · 08-11-2008

My video card is an NVIDIA GeForce 8400M GT. Doesn't contain any shared memory. It also isn't an SLI setup or anything just a single card.
http://www.notebookcheck.net/NVidia-...GT.3708.0.html

The thing that's throwing me off is that when I took out the original 1GB and put in the 2GB card I was getting the exact same numbers. I also have Vista SP1. 32-bit Vista should have no problem allowing 2.5-3.5GB of Physical Memory.