On Fri, Mar 21, 2008 at 12:46 PM, Ziots, Edward <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Its an X86 processor issue ...
It's actually not a processor issue. The processor can map RAM around address space that hardware needs, and with PAE, the processor can map to RAM above 4 GB, too. In Windows XP, Microsoft made the decision to just cordon off the upper part of the 32-bit virtual address space, reserving it for kernel, device drivers, and hardware I/O. Windows Server doesn't have that restriction (neither does Linux). One explanation I've read is that a lot of device drivers just assume addresses are within that space. Microsoft didn't want to deal with the support issues arising from broken drivers. Drivers for server hardware are usually better written, and servers started having > 2 GB RAM earlier. -- Ben ~ Upgrade to Next Generation Antispam/Antivirus with Ninja! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbelt-software.com/SunbeltMessagingNinja.cfm> ~
