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General discussion

How Much RAM Do I Have?

Oct 17, 2007 12:24PM PDT

Vista Home Basic

Purchased laptop with 1GB of RAM. In Control Panel/System it notes "Memory (RAM) 894 MB".
Where is the other 116MB?
I have ordered 2 1GB sticks to boost it to 2GB. Can I expect the listed memory to show 2GB or will it show something less?
The requirements by Microsoft say a minimum of 512MB. Mine is slow with 1GB so I don't see how 512MB would cut it.
Oh well, here's hoping I will see a dramatic imporvement with 2GB.

DC

Discussion is locked

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Integrated graphics, most likely...
Oct 17, 2007 1:23PM PDT

You do indeed have 1024MB (1GB) of RAM, but the missing 130MB is most likely used by integrated graphics. Well, 128MB of that anyway, with the other 2MB reserved for maintaining the hardware profiles. Even true graphics cards frequently use some RAM as its own memory, but since integrated graphics rarely have dedicated video memory the full amount must come out of your available system memory. After upgrading to 2GB the amount 'missing' will remain the same as it's not proportional to the amount of RAM installed, so you'll have approximately 1918MB to work with. You can also usually adjust the amount of memory allocated towards graphics through your system BIOS, but with 2GB of RAM I wouldn't worry about it.

John

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That Was Quick
Oct 17, 2007 1:31PM PDT

Thanks, John. I knew there had to be an explanation but had no idea what it was. You made it all make sense. I'll never live long enough to understand computers but it helps to have these forums to come to and get answers that I actually understand.
Thanks again.

DC