Vista - video card memory problem

I have Nvidia 7100GS with 512MB memory.
When I'm looking in the "display settings-->advanced settings--->adapter" on
my WinXP i can see that there is a total memory of 512MB, but on my Vista it
detects only 382MB of total memory.
I'v installed the latest driver release for Vista from the Nvidia site.

Someone told me that Vista suppports only 382MB of ram. is it true? It sound
a bit strange.. if not, what can be the reason for that?

From what I know micro$oft is making vista a gaming platform similar to the xbox system and they want developers to have a way to know there games can work or just fail on some hardware conditions todo this they have set ratings for the hardware of the computer and stored it allowing any program to autoconfigure itself to your environment.

DirectX10 in vista will use available system memory for graphics data because of way they are trying to standardise the mass of hardware configurations, for example my available graphics memory is 751mb when its really 256mb and my current system memory usage is 770mb.
This makes be believe a graphics card with more than 700mb memory would ruduce the amount of system memory vista uses from 770mb to around 200mb.
I havnt had a chance to check if the system memory usage would drop from more video ram because a dx10 card with 761mb ram to test this theory is just over $1200 where I live

"shirlytb" <shirlytb@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:CF20A4DD-99DB-42BA-9C73-077934102319@microsoft.com...
>I have Nvidia 7100GS with 512MB memory.
> When I'm looking in the "display settings-->advanced settings--->adapter"
> on
> my WinXP i can see that there is a total memory of 512MB, but on my Vista
> it
> detects only 382MB of total memory.
> I'v installed the latest driver release for Vista from the Nvidia site.
>
> Someone told me that Vista suppports only 382MB of ram. is it true? It
> sound
> a bit strange.. if not, what can be the reason for that?

No, what you have is a low end NVIDIA model that *can use* up to 512MB of
shared (read stolen from your main memory) memory.
If you look at the specs of a typical 7100GS card, you'll find that it has
only (typically) 128MB of on board video memory:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814125047

The remainder of needed memory is taken from your main memory. 512 - 128 =
up to 384MB taken from your main memory.
The notion that Vista supports only 382MB is hogwash. 32 bit Vista supports
up to 4 GB and 64 bit Vista supports much more.
I believe you are seeing *available* memory.