Hi,



I want to increase the amount of Ram in my PC from 2gb to 8gb - however I am
using the 32bit version of Vista.
Do I need to purchase a completely new copy of the 64 bit version, or can
Microsoft supply an "upgrade" of any kind, as the PC was bought from an OEM.

Thanks.

Bradley.

On Mon, 7 Jul 2008 01:11:20 +0100, "Bradley Thomas"
<bradley.a.thomas@xxxxxx> wrote:

> I want to increase the amount of Ram in my PC from 2gb to 8gb - however I am
> using the 32bit version of Vista.

Then you can not (unless you change to 64-bit Vista). All 32-bit
versions of Windows (not just Vista) have a 4GB address space. That's
the theoretical upper limit beyond which you can not go.

But you can't use the entire 4GB of address space. Even though you
have a 4GB address space, you can only use *around* 3.1GB of RAM.
That's because some of that space is used by hardware and is not
available to the operating system and applications. The amount you can
use varies, depending on what hardware you have installed, but can
range from as little as 2GB to as much as 3.5GB. It's usually around
3.1GB.

Note that the hardware is using the address *space*, not the actual
RAM itself. The rest of the RAM goes unused because there is no
address space to map it too.

> Do I need to purchase a completely new copy of the 64 bit version,

Yes.

> or can
> Microsoft supply an "upgrade" of any kind, as the PC was bought from an OEM.

OEM or not, there is no upgrade path from a 32-bit version to a 64-bit
version.

May I ask why you want so much memory? Despite the many people who
continually repeat "the more memory the better," that's true only up
to a point. Once you have enough RAM so that the system is no longer
paging, any additional RAM does next to nothing for you. At what point
that happens depends on what apps you run, but for most people running
common business applications under Windows Vista, that point is
usually somewhere in the 2-3GB range, and except for those doing
something like editing videos or large photographic images, more RAM
than that is largely wasted.

--
Ken Blake, Microsoft MVP - Windows Desktop Experience
Please Reply to the Newsgroup

"Bradley Thomas" wrote:

> Hi,
>
> I want to increase the amount of Ram in my PC from 2gb to 8gb - however I am
> using the 32bit version of Vista.
> Do I need to purchase a completely new copy of the 64 bit version, or can
> Microsoft supply an "upgrade" of any kind, as the PC was bought from an OEM.
>
> Thanks.
>
> Bradley.
>
>Hi

Yes
you have to buy Vista 64 bit if you want it the OEM version does not have
the upgrade rights that you get with the Retail version ,
Microsoft does not send the 64 bit disc for OEM .
You can buy the 64 bit Retail version or a OEM disc and install it you have
to format the drive because you can not upgrade from 32 bit to 64 bit
it has to be a clean install only .
Good Luck

"Bradley Thomas" <bradley.a.thomas@xxxxxx> wrote in message
news:Ot$w%23X83IHA.4332@xxxxxx

> Hi,
>
> I want to increase the amount of Ram in my PC from 2gb to 8gb - however I
> am using the 32bit version of Vista.
> Do I need to purchase a completely new copy of the 64 bit version, or can
> Microsoft supply an "upgrade" of any kind, as the PC was bought from an
> OEM.
>
> Thanks.
>
> Bradley.

You will need to purchase an upgrade edition of Vista. Depending on the
edition, you will then order the x64 dvd for $10 shipping and handling.
Vista Ultimate has both dvds in the box. All others only have the x86 dvd
and the instructions for ordering the x64 dvd. Upgrade in this case refers
to upgrading the license. The installation proceedure requires a custom
installation since you are migrating from x86 to x64.