The question of the title also opens up other questions such as: " why, even if I have 4 GB of RAM it is written that only 3.25 GB are available"> What is the maximum amount of RAM that can be mounted on the computer? " Each of these questions is entirely legitimate because everyone would be happy, after buying an update or a new PC, to see their computer travel at maximum power.
The question and, therefore, the answer to the questions above is however quite clear: if you use 32bit Windows, the maximum usable RAM is 4GB and from there you won't run away.
Leaving aside the rather complex technical reasons, just note the table published on a Microsoft support page to find out that Windows 7 supports at most 4GB in all its 32bit versions except the Windows 7 Starter which can use a maximum of 2GB.
These limits are also identical for Windows Vista and Windows 8 .
If instead you have a computer with a 64bit processor and you install a 64bit Windows version , the usable RAM limit is 128GB .
If you use Windows 7 32bit on a computer with 4GB of RAM, however, it turns out, going to the properties of the computer (Start -> Right click on Computer -> Properties ) that the available RAM memory is not 4GB, but 3.25 GB .
To find out where the other 0.75GB that the system is not using have gone, you can right-click on the taskbar, go to Task Manager -> Performance tab -> click on Resource Monitoring .
In the memory tab of the monitoring window you can graphically see how RAM is used and notice a gray area that corresponds exactly to the missing quantity.
That is the memory reserved for the video card, the BIOS and other drivers and it cannot be touched and this applies to both 32bit and 64bit PCs.
If you have a 64bit PC with 4 GB of RAM, you therefore have no advantage and it is undoubtedly advisable to switch to a lighter 32bit operating system.
In conclusion, if on a computer there are 6 or 8 GB of RAM but the operating system is Windows 7 32bit, 4Gb will always be the usable memory, indeed less because a part is reserved for the system.
These limits are related to hardware so there are no tricks or hacks to use more RAM or unlock memory that exceeds the technical limits.
There is only one trick that works and allows you to take advantage of more than 4GB of RAM on a 32bit computer .
Practically, if you have, for example, 6GB of RAM, you can succeed, by creating a virtual RAM Disk, to exploit the excess GB as a paging file .
This is a very simple operation and you can read the step-by-step guide in this article.
In another article, the guide on how to increase the Ram and add new memory to the PC.
