CODEWITHSUNDEEP
windows
David
David

Reputation: 28178

In 32bit why is the address space limit 2^31?

In 32bit why is the address space limit 2^31? instead of 2^32?

Upvotes: 1

Views: 1031

Answers (2)

Mitch Wheat
Mitch Wheat

Reputation: 300559

It's not.

The virtual address space for 32-bit Windows is 4 gigabytes (GB) [i.e 2^32] in size and divided into two partitions: one for use by the process and the other reserved for use by the system.

Ref.

Related: Memory Limits for Windows Releases

Upvotes: 2

David Heffernan
David Heffernan

Reputation: 612993

The address space is not limited to 2^31. The address space is 2^32. What you are referring to is that the kernel reserves the upper 2GB leaving applications the lower 2GB.

That's simply an implementation detail of 32 bit Windows. In fact you can run Windows in /3GB mode in which case applications can access 3GB of memory.

Upvotes: 6

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