Hi DOA,
You seem to know your stuff so can you explain the following:
Due to the operating system limitation, the actual memory size may be less than 4GB for the reservation for system usage under Windows® XP and Windows® Vista™. For Windows® XP 64-bit and Windows® Vista™ 64-bit with 64-bit CPU, there is no such limitation.
Yes i have the all singing dancing amd dual core with 3 gig of ram and yes it will not run with a true 4 gig.Yes my M/B can take 8 gig of ram also the performance is truly chronic as dual core is made to run 64 bit progs not 32.
You can make some difference by adding a processor with a high L2cache.
Check this link
http://www.infomaticsonline.co.uk/crn/comment/2137545/faster-speeds-slow-change