why doesn't my ram add up?

Question

my ram in use and my cache do not add up to my total ram. why?
the numbers aren't even close. i should have somewhere around 256, but it only adds up about 120-150.
where does the rest of the ram go?

Answer 1

cos your not ramming hard enough?

Answer 2

First of all, make sure you're looking in the right place. Cache can include the swap file which is on the hard drive, so don't look there. Instead, go to Start -> Run and type "dxdiag" (without the quotes) and hit OK. You can also right-click My Computer and go to Properties.

The amount here should be the total RAM minus what's being used by the video GPU. Laptops are a good example of where you typically find shared RAM for video, though many cheap PC's from Dell and HP still do that too.

Answer 3

Hey there Dude,

Where are you getting this number at?

If you do a Ctrl+alt+Del, and then choose the "Performance" tab, there is a box on the right side called "Physical Memory" The "Total" is what you really have for your OS.

Now, some really cheap computers, in an effort to "Save you money" have not put any video memory on the computer and use a portion of the physical memory for video memory.

For example, you might have 256 MB of ram, but it is fairly common to only have 192 availble for your computer. In this case, 64 MB is given to the video card.

This is more common in laptops than in desktops.

Hope this helps.

Tom

Answer 4

The ram that comes with the computer or the chip is not always at 256 my computer i boughy a 512 but it only adds up to 454 so its not perfect. Maybe the ram is not properly placed

Answer 5

120-150 is your available ram after you have loaded your operating system and startup programs