Tek-Tips is the largest IT community on the Internet today!

Members share and learn making Tek-Tips Forums the best source of peer-reviewed technical information on the Internet!

Register Log in
  • Congratulations gkittelson on being selected by the Tek-Tips community for having the most helpful posts in the forums last week. Way to Go!

why does Windows 7 64 bit Pro share main RAM with my video card?

Status
Not open for further replies.
zoldos

zoldos

Technical User
Nov 5, 2008
90
US
I recently bought/installed Windows 7 64 bit Pro full retail and upgraded my PC to 4 gigs of ram and an EVGA Nvidia Geforce GTX 580 with 1.5 gigs video ram. The system easily detects all 4 gigs of system ram however seems to be sharing it with the video card as the video card reports 2.9 gigs of ram and the main system reports 3.2 gigs of "usable" memory. I can't seem to find any settings for this. I already checked the BIOS settings and couldn't find anything there.

My motherboard is the ASUS A8N32 SLI Deluxe.

Any help with this would be appreciated. Thanks!
 
Sort by date Sort by votes
Is any 'on board' Video disabled?

Where are you getting your figures from?
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
I know the BIOS update on 2/16/2006, or around there, fixed an issue with incorrect memory sizing relayed by the BIOS so a BIOS update might be the ticket.

Although, Im inclined to go with stduc on this one. Almost every newer BIOS has the ability to share some memory with the Video, usually onboard. Look for anything under the Advanced Settings and I believe somewhere under the Processor tab there is an area to adjust memory timings and sharing.

"Silence is golden, duct tape is silver...
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
You should get version 1303 of the BIOS from ASUS support site. I have the 1409 beta version and it's a bit flaky. BTW, how is the sound support in Windows 7? It's very spotty in Linux. So far, I've only been able to get the Ubuntu distro to play sounds with this board.

Dan
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
The motherboard doesn't have any on-board video.

In Start Menu-->Computer-->right click-->Properties, it reports 4.00 GB installed memory, with "3.17 GB usable". Then in the Nvidia control panel under system information, it shows "Dedicated Video Memory: 1536 MB", "Shared System Memory: 1367 MB" and "Total Graphics Memory: 2903 MB"....
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
The sound is great on Windows 7. I did have to adjust one setting that was reducing my game sound effects by "80%". That was a bit tricky, but I figured it out.

I'm pretty sure I have the Feb. 2006 BIOS. I searched the BIOS settings high and low and couldn't find anything relating to sharing memory or video related settings...
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
I know with ATI cards, yo ucan use their utility to change numerous things while in Windows. Does this card come with any Nvidia Utility that controls the card?

"Silence is golden, duct tape is silver...
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
You may need to update your BIOS as mentioned by several people above. However before you do that check if you have Maximum memory checked in MSCONFIG.

Start>Run>enter MSCONFIG then
Boot>Advanced Options> Uncheck Maximum Memory if it is checked.

As for shared Memory - as far as I am aware there is nothing you can do about that video drivers etc all need RAM!
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
In the Control Panel\All Control Panel Items\System and the sub heading of System and Rating have you ever run the "Windows Experience Rating" or refreshed it?



RAM, Virtual Memory, PageFile and all that stuff.


Are you sure your machine is 64-bit and not 32-bit?

How much memory can Windows 7 32-bit support

Probably a Bios update is a good thing to check for
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
I'm running an AMD Athlon 64 FX60 with updated BIOS to fully detect it (the CPU). :)
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Run msconfig and see if Maximum Memory is set under Advanced Options on the Boot tab

 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Athlon 64 is not a 64 bit OS. Under system properties, right under where you saw the ram, under system type does it say 32 bit or 64 bit. because I agree with Linney, it sounds like it is 32 bit. As for the memory from the Nvidia control panel, here is from the knowledge Base:

In Windows XP, NVIDIA graphics card driver controls how system memory is allocated to the GPU. But with Windows Vista and Win7 it now controls the allocation of system memory to the GPU for TurboCache functions. The Display Properties pages show the shared system memory (SSM), or how much memory is allocated for NVIDIA GPUs to use for TurboCache.

For more information on graphics memory reporting under Windows, please visit the link below.

 
Upvote 0 Downvote
As stated in my original post, the OS is Windows 7 64 bit and I have confirmed this in system properties. I carefully checked all Nvidia driver settings and found nothing to change the shared memory settings.

In msconfig under boot, "max memory" is unchecked...
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Just out of curiosity, did you try the BIOS update yet?


"Silence is golden, duct tape is silver...
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Not yet, I looked into it, and I'm pretty sure I have the newest version. The motherboard is at least 5 years old and isn't really supported anymore. I'll take another look tho! Thx. :)
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Does this help? - On the ASUS site for your board (ASUS A8N32 SLI Deluxe.) I found this question:-
"I have install total 4GB memory on my motherboard. However, it can only recognize around 3.1GB or less. My friend's SLI board even less than 3GB. What's up? How should I do to recognize 4GB totally?"
See
Deluxe&s=21&hashedid=qTm2JotIWNbpEVrX&os=&no=D06D6034-D5C9-49C4-5E1B-CF724DB5C000

There is a pdf you can view that may answer your questions. It seems the architecture of that board with 4GB of RAM on board will use 800 MB for system resources and leave the Operating System 3.2GB - exactly your situation I believe. Link:-
It's all to do with MMIO and memory mapping.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Cool information, thanks! It didn't seem to specifically mention Windows 7, but I am 100% sure I have the 64 bit Professional version.

In any case, everything seems to run fine, games and otherwise...
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
The new Windows Display Driver Model (WDDM) in Windows Vista and Windows 7 deals with three different types of memory reservations:

1. Dedicated graphics memory - reflects the amount of memory physically present on the graphics adapter (a.k.a "on-board")
2. Dedicated system memory - system memory that is reserved ONLY for the graphics subsystem
3. Shared system memory - system memory that can be used by the graphics subsystem when needed, but can also be used by other non-graphics applications

The 3.2 GB is what's currently usable, but that number can change dynamically as needed. If the system ever demands more than 3.2 GB (not likely in most situations) then it can steal from shared system memory.


Here's a white paper that goes into a little more detail and shows examples:


-Carl
"Windows has detected you do not have a keyboard. Press 'F9" to continue."

[tab][navy]For this site's posting policies, click [/navy]here.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Status
Not open for further replies.

Similar threads

K
  • Locked
  • Question
Recover Data Windows 10 1
Replies
2
Views
3K
Rick998
Rick998
VicM
  • Locked
  • Question
Problem updating Windows Explorer
Replies
1
Views
690
Nancycaf
Nancycaf
pjw001
  • Locked
  • Question
Latest Windows Update - End of Service
Replies
2
Views
2K
pjw001
pjw001
pjw001
  • Locked
  • Question
Windows 11 Screen Colours have changed (slightly) 3
Replies
14
Views
4K
pjw001
pjw001
DTGMI
  • Locked
  • Question
WIN 10 Pro PC & Adding back to our Network
Replies
1
Views
620
pjw001
pjw001

Part and Inventory Search

Sponsor

Back
Top