XPS 630i and Vista Ultimate 64 bit

Thanks for the reply Chris. I understand your position but Dell HAS to know that Microsoft does not support more than 3gb of ram in its 32 bit version of Vista yet it still sells people more than that. I am sorry but that is an excuse. Technically Dell is correct in stating its computer will "see" the 4gb but being able to use it with the OS that Dell sells is another story. Anyways...what I am really looking for here is suggestions on where to turn to be able to run 64 bit Vista which will "see" all of the memory. Chris, when will Dell release 64 bit drivers for the 630i model?

Thanks!

 

Tim

Awesome news! Thanks for your reply! I'll give it a whirl.

timmmah,

The PC does see all of the ram, just check in the bios. It is not our fault that the operating system does not address all 4GB of ram. That is a very well known Microsoft limitation.

timma, I just received my new 630i yesterday.  It was ordered with XP Pro and the additional COA for Vista Ultimate.   After reading this board I also contacted Dell and requested the free 64-bit disc for Ultimate because I planned on installing more than the 4GB.  At first I thought something was wrong when I went to the support site and there was no selection for Vista 64-bit in the drivers section.  However, upon closer examination I noticed that some of the drivers listed supported both 32 and 64  bit versions.  Thus I started my install from the disc provided by Dell.  To my surprise, once the installation was done the only device that needed a driver installed was the video card.  That driver I pulled from Nvidia's site directly as Dell does not keep up to date in a timely fashion for those.  The end result is my system is seeing all 8GB and is functioning perfectly under Vista.

Hi timmmah

 

You can get Windows Vista 64-bit from Dell for Free 

 

 

Read this From DELL-Bill_B

 

http://www.dellcommunity.com/supportforums/board/message?board.id=Tech_Talk_XPS&message.id=60095#M60095

From Chris

My computer
Dell Dimension 1100
Microsoft Windows XP Home SP3
512 MB of Ram
Nvidia Geforce FX 5200 256MB
Intel Celeron CPU 2.53GHz
Dell E196FP
HDD WDC WD800BB-75JCO 80GB C:
HDD Samsung SV2042H 20GB F:
TSSTcorp CDRWDVD TS-H492C D:
LITE-ON DVDRW LDW-851S E:
Linksys Wireless-G WUSB54GS With SpeedBooster
Logitech Cordless Desktop EX 90
Logitech Cordless Click Plus Rechargeable Optical Mouse
Mozilla Firefox 2.0.0.14
Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1

My Security Software
Avanquest SystemSuite 8 Professional
Windows Defender

To be fair, it's acutally a limitation of all 32bit OS's not just Microsoft. 

 

Chris, Dell does offer a 64bit driver page for all of the other XPS desktops currently on sale.  210, 420 and 730.  Why can't the 630i have a 64bit page?

Thanks for all the replies. It is strange that Dell has 64bit driver pages for the rest of the XPS models. Maybe because the 630i is still new their web people haven't had a chance to update the page yet.

 

To everyone interested...I've managed to get my system somewhat stable on Vista Ultimate 64 bit.  I wish I would have known about Dell offerring to ship out copies of Vista 64 bit if you had purchased 32 bit but I had already been told no by a support rep so I bought a Technet subscription for 200 bucks. Not a total loss there but it would have been nice for Dell to have communicated that to all of its support staff. Anways....

 

Does anyone have experience with the Nvidia control panel and Vista 64 bit? The problem I am having now is BSODs everytime I attempt to load the Nvidia performance module or go into SLI mode.

 

Thanks everyone!

 

Tim 

Crucial.com has a helpful page explaining the whole memory maximums/usage issue, and includes a list of the limits for all XP and Vista versions:

 

http://www.crucial.com/kb/answer.aspx?qid=4251

"BSOD" stands for "Blue Screen Of Death" (crashes that typically are unrecoverable, and cause a forced reboot of your system).

 

I'm not an expert on the 64-bit issue, but a significant amount of software and hardware drivers do not support 64-bit versions of Vista. Generally, 32-bit is safer at this point. As it is, there are still a number of issues with  Vista regardless of the 32/64-bit aspect (which is why XP is still so popular).

BSOD = Blue Screen Of Death. I think the policy has changed on the free upgrade - ultimate and business only as of yesterday.

I'm ignorant, but can someone please explain what is BSOD?  And are there any major disadvantages to switching to 64 bit rather than staying at 32 bit?  I too would like to take advantage of all my memory...

Has anyone been able to successfully run in SLI mode with a 630i in Vista 64 bit? If so, what version of Nvidia's CP are you using? Video Driver version? Mainboard?

 

Thanks!