ATI Radeon HD 4350 RAM - help!

[gups]

Hi guys - I recently bought a Dell Vostro 420 (XP Pro 32-bit) with an ATI Radeon HD4350 512MB PCIe x16 Video Card. From what I understand, this should have 512MB of onboard VRAM.

However, when I open Catalyst Control Center and look under Graphics Hardware in the Information Center, the Memory Size says: "1024MB", while the Memory Type says: "HyperMemory"

Here's what System Information tells me about the Adapter:

Is this the wrong graphics card, or am I missing something here? Nowhere have I been able to verify that the onboard memory on this card is 512MB. I think they may have installed the wrong card...

Thanks for any help with this!

Name ATI Radeon HD 4300/4500 Series
PNP Device ID PCI\VEN_1002&DEV_954F&SUBSYS_904E1028&REV_00\4&399D3C6A&0&0008
Adapter Type ATI Radeon [COLOR=blue ! important][COLOR=blue ! important]Graphics [COLOR=blue ! important]Processor[/COLOR][/COLOR][/COLOR] (0x954F), ATI Technologies Inc. compatible
Adapter Description ATI Radeon HD 4300/4500 Series
Adapter RAM 1.00 GB (1,073,741,824 bytes)
Installed Drivers ati2dvag.dll
Driver Version 6.14.10.7050
INF File oem21.inf (ati2mtag_R7X section)
Color Planes 1
[COLOR=blue ! important][COLOR=blue ! important]Color [COLOR=blue ! important]Table[/COLOR][/COLOR][/COLOR] Entries 4294967296
Resolution 1680 x 1050 x 60 hertz
Bits/Pixel 32
Memory Address 0xD0000000-0xDFFFFFFF
Memory Address 0xFE9F0000-0xFE9FFFFF
I/O Port 0x0000C000-0x0000CFFF
IRQ Channel IRQ 16
I/O Port 0x000003B0-0x000003BB
I/O Port 0x000003C0-0x000003DF
Memory Address 0xA0000-0xBFFFF
Driver c:\windows\system32\drivers\ati2mtag.sys (6.14.10.7050, 4.39 MB (4,605,952 bytes), 11/13/2009 3:55 AM)

 

[gups]

Also, I installed CPU-Z to check on the graphics adapter details. When I check the Graphics tab under the "Display Device Selection," it shows two entries. One entry says "Radeon HD 4350" and under Memory Size it says "512MB." But there is another entry, which says "ATI Radeon HD 4300/4500 Series" and under the memory size of that one, it says "1024MB."

I only have one graphics adapter currently. I find it strange that CPU-Z shows two entries...

 

[daveybrat]

Nothing to worry about. Your card is a 512MB card. The 1GB Hypermemory is just like Nvidia's TurboCache technology in that it uses part of your system ram to supposedly 'improve' performance.

You only have physically 512MB of ram, and another 512MB of virtual ram.

 

[gups]

Thanks for your response Daveybrat!

I just ran GPU-Z, and here's the output. I guess, it does show that it's a 512MB card. I am just wondering why that information does not show up in System Information or under the Adapter tab in Control Panel-Display-Settings-Advanced, or for that matter in the CCC! Also, it seems odd that CPU-Z has two entries for the GPU...

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Card Name: ATI Radeon HD 4300/4500 Series
Owner: Submitted: 2010-02-24 21:50:23
Owner's Comments:
GPU: RV710 Revision:
Technology: 55 nm Die Size: 73 mm²
BIOS Version: VER011.017.000.015.033511 Device ID: 1002 - 954F
Bus Interface: PCI-E 2.0 x16 @ x16 Subvendor: Dell (1028)
ROPs: 4 Shaders: 80 (DX 10.1)
Pixel Fillrate: 2.4 GPixel/s Texture Fillrate: 4.8 GTexel/s
Memory Type: DDR2 Bus Width: 64 bit
Memory Size: 512 MB Bandwidth: 6.4 GB/s
Driver: ati2mtag 6.14.10.7050 (Catalyst 10.2) / XP
GPU Clock: 600 MHz 400 MHz
Default Clock: 600 MHz 400 MHz
Overclock: - -
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

So, from the GPU-Z readout it looks like this is a 512MB with an extra 512MB of "hypermemory" enabled, just like Daveybrat said. I am pretty sure I don't want or need the extra 512MB.

Q. Is there any way to disable HyperMemory? I looked under BIOS settings and under the CCC settings, but did not see any option to do so.

Also, I understand that a 32-bit OS can only address 4GB of total system RAM. Right now, I have 3GB of installed RAM. With this card on the PCIe x16 slot, my system (under Task Manager-Performance-Physical Memory) does indeed recognize all 3GB of RAM.
I was thinking of adding this card on the PCIe x1 lane to get quad monitor support:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814161280

I don't think this card has hypermemory.

Q. If I add this card, will I see a decrease in my usable RAM?