how much does windows vista drain from RAM and hard drive?

I just bought a computer with windows vista home premium.

My computer has

2048 MB DDR2 SDRAM
160 GB HDD (5400 RPM)

Now it says I have 1918 MB RAM and 147 GB total (ie 132 GB free of 147 GB).
Does that make sense?

Thanks.

Yes it does. More than likely the RAM that is shown missing is allocated to
the video system (if you have onboard Video) and the Hard drive is about
right because of the following as explained by Western Digital:

Decimal vs. Binary:
For simplicity and consistency, hard drive manufacturers define a megabyte
as 1,000,000 bytes and a gigabyte as 1,000,000,000 bytes. This is a decimal
(base 10) measurement and is the industry standard. However, certain system
BIOSs, FDISK and Windows define a megabyte as 1,048,576 bytes and a gigabyte
as 1,073,741,824 bytes. Mac systems also use these values. These are binary
(base 2) measurements.

To Determine Decimal Capacity:
A decimal capacity is determined by dividing the total number of bytes, by
the number of bytes per gigabyte (1,000,000,000 using base 10).

To Determine Binary Capacity:
A binary capacity is determined by dividing the total number of bytes, by
the number of bytes per gigabyte (1,073,741,824 using base 2).

--
Paul


"M" wrote:

> I just bought a computer with windows vista home premium.
>
> My computer has
>
> 2048 MB DDR2 SDRAM
> 160 GB HDD (5400 RPM)
>
> Now it says I have 1918 MB RAM and 147 GB total (ie 132 GB free of 147 GB).
> Does that make sense?
>
> Thanks.
>

Perfect sense.

Your system most likely has video built onto the motherboard, and it's
sharing your system RAM. 2048-1918 = 130 which is pretty close to 128,
which is a common amount of RAM to allocate for video (some rounding errors
occur)

Likewise, hard drives are marketed on with an actual count of bytes , 160
billion in your case. Windows (and many other computer programs) display
the GigaBytes based on Base-2 number system approximations, where 1024 bytes
= 1 KiloByte. So, divide 160,000,000,000 by 1024 three times o get to the
GB approximation, and you have approximately 147. Of which, apparently 15GB
is already used on your system for Windows and other applications.

Oh, and there is probably a hidden partion of a few gigabytes size that
holds your restoration files, rather than the manufacturer sending you DVDs
to restore from. Check your documentation on how to back those up.

Does that clear up the apparent inconsistencies?

Val


"M" <> wrote in message
news:5ED033A9-FA14-4E69-BC52-...
I just bought a computer with windows vista home premium.

My computer has

2048 MB DDR2 SDRAM
160 GB HDD (5400 RPM)

Now it says I have 1918 MB RAM and 147 GB total (ie 132 GB free of 147 GB).
Does that make sense?

Thanks.

"Val" <> wrote in message
news:...
> Perfect sense.
>
> Your system most likely has video built onto the motherboard, and it's
> sharing your system RAM. 2048-1918 = 130 which is pretty close to 128,
> which is a common amount of RAM to allocate for video (some rounding
> errors
> occur)
>
> Likewise, hard drives are marketed on with an actual count of bytes , 160
> billion in your case. Windows (and many other computer programs) display
> the GigaBytes based on Base-2 number system approximations, where 1024
> bytes
> = 1 KiloByte. So, divide 160,000,000,000 by 1024 three times o get to
> the
> GB approximation, and you have approximately 147. Of which, apparently
> 15GB
> is already used on your system for Windows and other applications.
>
> Oh, and there is probably a hidden partion of a few gigabytes size that
> holds your restoration files, rather than the manufacturer sending you
> DVDs
> to restore from. Check your documentation on how to back those up.
>
> Does that clear up the apparent inconsistencies?
>
> Val
>
>
> "M" <> wrote in message
> news:5ED033A9-FA14-4E69-BC52-...
> I just bought a computer with windows vista home premium.
>
> My computer has
>
> 2048 MB DDR2 SDRAM
> 160 GB HDD (5400 RPM)
>
> Now it says I have 1918 MB RAM and 147 GB total (ie 132 GB free of 147
> GB).
> Does that make sense?
>
> Thanks.
>
>

Isn't math just wonderful! LOL

wow, that cleared it up. thanks so much!

"Chris Denny" wrote:

> "Val" <> wrote in message
> news:...
> > Perfect sense.
> >
> > Your system most likely has video built onto the motherboard, and it's
> > sharing your system RAM. 2048-1918 = 130 which is pretty close to 128,
> > which is a common amount of RAM to allocate for video (some rounding
> > errors
> > occur)
> >
> > Likewise, hard drives are marketed on with an actual count of bytes , 160
> > billion in your case. Windows (and many other computer programs) display
> > the GigaBytes based on Base-2 number system approximations, where 1024
> > bytes
> > = 1 KiloByte. So, divide 160,000,000,000 by 1024 three times o get to
> > the
> > GB approximation, and you have approximately 147. Of which, apparently
> > 15GB
> > is already used on your system for Windows and other applications.
> >
> > Oh, and there is probably a hidden partion of a few gigabytes size that
> > holds your restoration files, rather than the manufacturer sending you
> > DVDs
> > to restore from. Check your documentation on how to back those up.
> >
> > Does that clear up the apparent inconsistencies?
> >
> > Val
> >
> >
> > "M" <> wrote in message
> > news:5ED033A9-FA14-4E69-BC52-...
> > I just bought a computer with windows vista home premium.
> >
> > My computer has
> >
> > 2048 MB DDR2 SDRAM
> > 160 GB HDD (5400 RPM)
> >
> > Now it says I have 1918 MB RAM and 147 GB total (ie 132 GB free of 147
> > GB).
> > Does that make sense?
> >
> > Thanks.
> >
> >
>
> Isn't math just wonderful! LOL
>
>