One of the biggest disadvantages of Windows XP is that the most widely used and compatible version is based on 32-bit. This means that a maximum of 4 GB of RAM can be addressed—overhead from drivers and other system components further reduce this already low value. In the most extreme case I have encountered so far, on a Quad-SLI Retro XP PC: Due to four graphics cards and plenty of other hardware, only a meager 1.44 GB of RAM is available. However, a whopping 64 GB are installed there in the form of eight 8 GB memory modules*.

But even the RetroBooks have a maximum of 16 GB of RAM installed, of which only about 3.25 GB can be used under XP. The same applies to the Acer Veriton S670G – 8 GB are available, but less than half can be used.

You could install the 64-bit version of Windows XP, but many things don’t work on it and there are no functioning drivers for some things. Or you could build a hybrid that removes or extends the RAM limitation, but this brings other problems with it. That’s what this is about now:

PAE?

“Physical Address Extension” – The built-in processor must support this. The software support has the same name. Under Windows, the 4 GB limit is artificial: “Product segmentation”. How can you tell? Even Windows 2000 Advanced Server can use more than 4 GB of RAM, as can Server 2003. Both are 32-bit operating systems.

To make 32-bit Windows XP (with a suitable CPU) suitable for up to 128 GB of RAM, you have to implant two components of the 64-bit version of XP and change the boot parameters. However, there are also disadvantages to this, which I will discuss later.

Modification

First, you need to obtain two specific files from Windows XP 64-bit. You can either extract them from the ISO or download them from MediaFire (archive.org).

Then copy both files to “C:\Windows\System32\” under 32-bit XP. Once this is done, you need to edit “boot.ini” – it is best to add a second entry so that you can still boot normally if problems arise.

The easiest way to do this is as follows (boot.ini is hidden by default):

Add a second entry below the existing one (make sure that the partition etc. matches):

multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional (RAM-Limit entfernt)" /kernel=ntkl64g.exe /hal=hal64g.dll /fastdetect /PAE /noexecute=alwaysoff

multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional (RAM-Limit entfernt)" /kernel=ntkl64g.exe /hal=hal64g.dll /fastdetect /PAE /noexecute=alwaysoff

The entire “boot.ini” should then look something like this:

;
;Warning: Boot.ini is used on Windows XP and earlier operating systems.
;Warning: Use BCDEDIT.exe to modify Windows Vista boot options.
;
[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional (Original)" /NOEXECUTE=OPTIN /FASTDETECT
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional (RAM-Limit entfernt)" /kernel=ntkl64g.exe /hal=hal64g.dll /fastdetect /PAE /noexecute=alwaysoff

;
;Warning: Boot.ini is used on Windows XP and earlier operating systems.
;Warning: Use BCDEDIT.exe to modify Windows Vista boot options.
;
[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional (Original)" /NOEXECUTE=OPTIN /FASTDETECT
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional (RAM-Limit entfernt)" /kernel=ntkl64g.exe /hal=hal64g.dll /fastdetect /PAE /noexecute=alwaysoff

Then simply save the file with CTRL+S or via the menu, close everything, and restart the computer. When booting up, a selection menu should now appear each time, allowing you to choose between the two entries.

Alternatively, you can also use a patcher, but I prefer the method with the additional original files from Microsoft.

Side effects

Some problems have been reported, the most common being:

• General instability
• Driver problems
• Bluescreens
• Disk formatting rarely works or no longer works at all
• Problems with standby or power states in general

These problems may or may not occur. Personally, I have only encountered the problem with disk formatting on RetroBooks – and that the boot process occasionally fails and simply continues loading indefinitely. Once the system is up and running, there is no instability.

Incidentally, a single process still cannot use more than 2 GB. So “only” the overall system benefits in the form of more breathing room.

Conclusion

This modification is not 100% reliable. However, since you can boot normally at any time, it’s a nice, playful addition that you can choose to use or not use each time you start up.

I have modified all XP-based systems with more than 4 GB of physical RAM in this way.

Der Beitrag Full RAM ahead – Windows XP PAE modification erschien zuerst auf flohs blog.

This modification only needs to be carried out on Windows XP, as the GTX TITAN X was not natively supported by Nvidia there. Compared to the RetroBooks driver mod for the Quadro 2000M MXM card, this procedure is virtually harmless.

I found the information on this page (archive.org).
The latest official driver from 2016 for Windows XP can be downloaded here (archive.org) from Nvidia.

Let’s go…

As described in the linked tutorial, only one file needs to be modified. Notepad++ is again useful for this.

First, proceed as if you were simply installing the downloaded driver. This setup will abort after a short period of activity, displaying the message “No compatible graphics hardware found.”

Then navigate to the folder where the graphics driver was extracted, usually something like “C:\NVIDIA\DisplayDriver\368.81\WinXP\International” and locate the file “nv4_dispi.inf”.

For additional compatibility with Nvidia GTX 970, GTX 980, GTX 980 Ti, GTX TITAN X and Quadro M6000 graphics cards, edit the following in this file:

First, in the section

[NVIDIA_Devices.NTx86.5.1]

[NVIDIA_Devices.NTx86.5.1]

The following should be added at the end:

%NVIDIA_DEV.13C2%           = Section008, PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_13C2
%NVIDIA_DEV.13C0%           = Section008, PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_13C0
%NVIDIA_DEV.17C8%           = Section008, PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_17C8
%NVIDIA_DEV.17C2%           = Section008, PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_17C2
%NVIDIA_DEV.17F0%           = Section012, PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_17F0

%NVIDIA_DEV.13C2%           = Section008, PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_13C2
%NVIDIA_DEV.13C0%           = Section008, PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_13C0
%NVIDIA_DEV.17C8%           = Section008, PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_17C8
%NVIDIA_DEV.17C2%           = Section008, PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_17C2
%NVIDIA_DEV.17F0%           = Section012, PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_17F0

Subsequently, in section

[Strings]

[Strings]

Add the following:

NVIDIA_DEV.13C2 = "NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970"
NVIDIA_DEV.13C0 = "NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980"
NVIDIA_DEV.17C8 = "NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980 Ti"
NVIDIA_DEV.17C2 = "NVIDIA GeForce GTX TITAN X"
NVIDIA_DEV.17F0 = "NVIDIA Quadro M6000"

NVIDIA_DEV.13C2 = "NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970"
NVIDIA_DEV.13C0 = "NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980"
NVIDIA_DEV.17C8 = "NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980 Ti"
NVIDIA_DEV.17C2 = "NVIDIA GeForce GTX TITAN X"
NVIDIA_DEV.17F0 = "NVIDIA Quadro M6000"

That’s it?

Yes. Now save the file and restart the installation using the usual “setup.exe”. It will now run successfully as desired.

Der Beitrag <h5>Retro-XP-PC #6: </h5><h3><b>Modify the graphics driver</b></h3> erschien zuerst auf flohs blog.