Went Crossfire and available ram dropped

[DaPoets]

I added another x1950Pro 512meg PCIe card and so I just have 1 monitor plugged into each card so that the resources are spread between the two. I did notice that my available ram in Windows XP Home Edition dropped from 3.41GB down to 3.01GB when I added the 2nd card. I have 4 gigs of ram and Windows XP64 (I dual boot) will show 4.19GB of available ram. I knew all of this except for the ram from the video cards stacking and reducing my available ram in XP32. In theory I figured that since video ram doesn't stack when using Crossfire that it shouldn't stack when taking away from available ram... oh well, I'll just have to live with only 3GB :beer: lol

(4x1)gb PC6400

This isn't a problem thread, just a fact thread for those that didn't know this.

[Yellowbeard XMS]

In theory I figured that since video ram doesn't stack when using Crossfire that it shouldn't stack when taking away from available ram... oh well, I'll just have to live with only 3GB :beer: lol

(4x1)gb PC6400

This isn't a problem thread, just a fact thread for those that didn't know this.

Interesting find, I'll add it to my "mental toolbox". My guess is that the OS detects this memory regardless of what the ATI driver does with it. Since it is detected, the OS allocates address space for the card which, as you obviously know, takes away from the available system memory.

[aja]

Maybe the driver is reserving RAM for the g/cards - that is my guess

kinda like hypermemory on cheapy cards...

Check your BIOS for memory options...