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Just got a Samsung Vibrant.
I noticed the phone says I only have 326MB of total RAM. I thought this phone was suppose to have 512MB of RAM? Is 326MB normal or did I get an odd phone?
No that's right. It's all the kernel will allow us to use. Even with the unofficial froyo roms out, we only get 341mb.
Friends don't let friends flash drunk...
Cool. Thank you for the information.
Ravynmagi said:
Hmm... Seems strange they make Android phones with 512 and 768MB of RAM. Will the official Froyo be able to access more RAM?
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Click to collapse
It's also strange that hard drive manufacturers advertise a "500GB" hard drive when you really only get about 465GB of actual usable space.
Same concept. Froyo may be able to utilize more RAM than Eclair but you'll never get the full "512MB"
jrizk07 said:
It's also strange that hard drive manufacturers advertise a "500GB" hard drive when you really only get about 465GB of actual usable space.
Same concept. Froyo may be able to utilize more RAM than Eclair but you'll never get the full "512MB"
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Click to collapse
I would say it is more like on your PC. You may have 4 GB installed, but when you look at it it will tell you you have only access to 3.5 GB because other hardware is using the memory, like a shared GPU etc.
jrizk07 said:
It's also strange that hard drive manufacturers advertise a "500GB" hard drive when you really only get about 465GB of actual usable space.
Same concept. Froyo may be able to utilize more RAM than Eclair but you'll never get the full "512MB"
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Click to collapse
I'm getting tired of people making these retarded f****ng comparisons. Hard Drive capacities go down due to formating. Also, a 1 byte file takes up the smallest allocation unit on the drive, so space is wasted there as well. Better file systems are better about it, but unless you're writing raw data to the hard drive there's no way to avoid formatting it and losing space or writing data to it and losing space due to allocation boundaries. I've never heard of anyone Formatting RAM, have you? If the smallest allocation unit on the HDD is 4KB, then a 1Byte file will really take up 4KB on the drive's FS.
RAM is totally different. If there is 512 RAM there's 512 RAM. The only time you will see less than your amount of RAM on a computer is if the computer is allocatting a certain amount of RAM for use by an integrated graphics card (or something else).
Problem with our phones is that they're set up like the latter.
We don't have 512 RAM. We never have, and we never will. We haev 340'ish and the rest is GPU RAM. You're never going to run general applications on that RAM.
Oh. I had edited my reply because I had assumed I found my answer from this...
developer.android.com/sdk/android-2.2-highlights.html
"HIGHMEM support for RAM >256MB"
I had assumed that mean the official Froyo when we got it would have 512MB available.
So I guess I misunderstood their meaning there. So the 326MB is pretty much the max my applications will have to work with on this phone?
I guess I'm puzzled because I was in T-Mobile a couple days ago and I was going back and forth between getting this Vibrant and the MyTouch 4G. The MyTouch 4G advertises 768MB of RAM, while the Vibrant advertises 512MB of RAM.
So now I'm back to my original confusion. Why would HTC put 768MB of RAM in the MyTouch 4G if Android can't even use 512MB? *confused*
Ya'll compared it to the Windows XP limitation with only seeing 3.2-ish GB of RAM. But Dell doesn't install 8GB of RAM in Windows XP computers either. I guess I could maybe understand the 512MB phones if some of the memory is going towards video. But the 768MB phone doesn't make sense then.
This is my first Android device, so I'm still trying to figure out these things. Sorry for the dumb questions.
Ravynmagi said:
Oh. I had edited my reply because I had assumed I found my answer from this...
developer.android.com/sdk/android-2.2-highlights.html
"HIGHMEM support for RAM >256MB"
I had assumed that mean the official Froyo when we got it would have 512MB available.
So I guess I misunderstood their meaning there. So the 326MB is pretty much the max my applications will have to work with on this phone?
I guess I'm puzzled because I was in T-Mobile a couple days ago and I was going back and forth between getting this Vibrant and the MyTouch 4G. The MyTouch 4G advertises 768MB of RAM, while the Vibrant advertises 512MB of RAM.
So now I'm back to my original confusion. Why would HTC put 768MB of RAM in the MyTouch 4G if Android can't even use 512MB? *confused*
Ya'll compared it to the Windows XP limitation with only seeing 3.2-ish GB of RAM. But Dell doesn't install 8GB of RAM in Windows XP computers either. I guess I could maybe understand the 512MB phones if some of the memory is going towards video. But the 768MB phone doesn't make sense then.
This is my first Android device, so I'm still trying to figure out these things. Sorry for the dumb questions.
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Click to collapse
First of all. There are no dumb question. Second. Android uses all of the RAM. But as the phone reserves memory for hardware and other system essential services, you will only be able to use a certain amount of the memory. In this case around 345 out of the 512. The rest is put away so that the OS can run stable etc.
So for the MyTouch 4G it says that there is 768 MB installed, but you won't see all of that. The phone will reserve certain amount for it's hardware and you will never be able to free it unless you know how to change the kernel.
Hope this clears any confusion up.
Ravynmagi said:
Ya'll compared it to the Windows XP limitation with only seeing 3.2-ish GB of RAM. But Dell doesn't install 8GB of RAM in Windows XP computers either. I guess I could maybe understand the 512MB phones if some of the memory is going towards video. But the 768MB phone doesn't make sense then.
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Click to collapse
for xp, the memory limitation is due to 32bit memory addressing. 32bits can address a theoretical 4gb, however due to also addressing gpu memory and probably some other reasons xp can't address the entire 4gb and so you see 3.xGB.
i can't really speak to android or the vibrant, but i'm guessing (like others have said) we are losing some of our ram in a share with the gpu.
I think most people are missing the issue here.
The phones are advertised as having 512 MB RAM.
When you buy a computer, and it says 512, it comes with 512 (only exception is the one I stated - integrated graphics cards sharing system RAM - but that is usually listed on the Computer Spec sheet).
So, when they get a phone and it says 512 MB RAM, they expect for there to be 512 Application-accessible RAM on the device.
HTC adds more RAM to put the user closer to the advertised specs. Most other manufacturers do not.
So users end up with 326 MB RAM wondering if they got what they paid for.
Which... they really didn't if you use you common sense, but companies will always use technicalities tand semantics o defend their decisions and/or actions.
N8ter said:
I think most people are missing the issue here.
The phones are advertised as having 512 MB RAM.
When you buy a computer, and it says 512, it comes with 512 (only exception is the one I stated - integrated graphics cards sharing system RAM - but that is usually listed on the Computer Spec sheet).
So, when they get a phone and it says 512 MB RAM, they expect for there to be 512 Application-accessible RAM on the device.
HTC adds more RAM to put the user closer to the advertised specs. Most other manufacturers do not.
So users end up with 326 MB RAM wondering if they got what they paid for.
Which... they really didn't if you use you common sense, but companies will always use technicalities tand semantics o defend their decisions and/or actions.
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Click to collapse
I completely agree with you. In fact some of us in xda have discovered that sgs indeed has less than 512MB of RAM. We are still somehow trying to defend Samsung by say Galaxy TAB has more RAM (when Samsung advertise 512MB only for TAB)!
On a side note - Hard Drive capacity is measured in millions of bytes hence 500,000millionbytes
will be around 465GB only (unformated)!
Sent from my GT-I9000 using XDA App
I doubt ~170 mb is being allocated for the radio and for hardware addressing space. It's my opinion that the phone actually only comes with 384mb ram.
raduque said:
I doubt ~170 mb is being allocated for the radio and for hardware addressing space. It's my opinion that the phone actually only comes with 384mb ram.
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no.
10ch
Prankey said:
I completely agree with you. In fact some of us in xda have discovered that sgs indeed has less than 512MB of RAM. We are still somehow trying to defend Samsung by say Galaxy TAB has more RAM (when Samsung advertise 512MB only for TAB)!
On a side note - Hard Drive capacity is measured in millions of bytes hence 500,000millionbytes
will be around 465GB only (unformated)!
Sent from my GT-I9000 using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Many do list that but what makes the drives smaller is formatting. The raw size is what it is, but the formatted capacity is much less. You can ser this on sf cards easily. Format it as fat32 then ntfs, and the end (formatted) capacities will be different. Then play with allocation sizes as well ;p
If you have hordes of small files it can really eat inyo the space on ut hard drive, as well, since a file can only be as small as the smallest cluster size in the filesystem.
Even if they made the drive 1024mb x however many gb they say it is, that will be instantly cut fown tje minute you format a fs onto the drive. There is also space the fs reserves for system use, as well. Mft and such.
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App
anthonys2r said:
no.
10ch
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Click to collapse
He's right hardware addrrssimg shouldn't need that much, and graphics in a phone shouldn't need that much either. Maybe so,eone should sue Samsumg for false advertisement and see what they say.
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App
anthonys2r said:
no.
10ch
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Click to collapse
You can "no." all you want, but unless you have proof to the contrary, I'm going to stick with my OPINION that the phone has 384mb.
There's no way in hell the Radio, hardware addressing space and/or GPU frame buffer use 170-180mb of the ram.
raduque said:
You can "no." all you want, but unless you have proof to the contrary, I'm going to stick with my OPINION that the phone has 384mb.
There's no way in hell the Radio, hardware addressing space and/or GPU frame buffer use 170-180mb of the ram.
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I agree just checked and vibrant shows similar ram to htc aria, which has 384mb ram stock.
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App
raduque said:
You can "no." all you want, but unless you have proof to the contrary, I'm going to stick with my OPINION that the phone has 384mb.
There's no way in hell the Radio, hardware addressing space and/or GPU frame buffer use 170-180mb of the ram.
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Click to collapse
There is a thread in the i9k forum that details the amounts of ram reserved in the kernel source. Just about every feature on the phone has dedicated ram, weather or not it's currently in use. That plus what the kernel shows as available adds up to 512mb. It's stupid, but that's how it is. Poor and lazy software engineering, IMO. Unfortunately, doing the allocation in a sane way and having it work in android properly is very difficult without all of the source, which we will probably never have.
It's not really any better with other manufacturers. They all do it. I think they ought to be required to disclose user available ram amounts, but nobody cares what I think.
N8ter said:
I'm getting tired of people making these retarded f****ng comparisons. Hard Drive capacities go down due to formating. Also, a 1 byte file takes up the smallest allocation unit on the drive, so space is wasted there as well. Better file systems are better about it, but unless you're writing raw data to the hard drive there's no way to avoid formatting it and losing space or writing data to it and losing space due to allocation boundaries. I've never heard of anyone Formatting RAM, have you? If the smallest allocation unit on the HDD is 4KB, then a 1Byte file will really take up 4KB on the drive's FS.
RAM is totally different. If there is 512 RAM there's 512 RAM. The only time you will see less than your amount of RAM on a computer is if the computer is allocatting a certain amount of RAM for use by an integrated graphics card (or something else).
Problem with our phones is that they're set up like the latter.
We don't have 512 RAM. We never have, and we never will. We haev 340'ish and the rest is GPU RAM. You're never going to run general applications on that RAM.
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Click to collapse
I had 326 RAM .After installation of FROYO 2.2,my Galaxy can see only 304 RAm.Why?I expected to get more RAM with FROYO 2.2 Why did this happened?
N8ter said:
He's right hardware addrrssimg shouldn't need that much, and graphics in a phone shouldn't need that much either. Maybe so,eone should sue Samsumg for false advertisement and see what they say.
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App
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Click to collapse
Maybe you should do it. You know, since you know exactly what you're talking about.
Just a dumb question but has any one tried removing and replacing the ram chip on an evo 4g with a larger one like 1 or 2 gig , I have an old sony ux 280 and many people have unsoldered the core single and replaced it with a core duo just wondered if this had been tried with the evo
thanks
I don't think its possible to remove and replace the ram on a soc.
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA
anything's possible... i'd be surprised if it wasn't, but i personally don't want to ruin my phone trying unless its been done haha
austin420 said:
I don't think its possible to remove and replace the ram on a soc.
Sent from my SPH-D700 using XDA
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Click to collapse
I don't think the snapdragon in the EVO contains the ram, I think it's separate. However, with that said, I still don't see anyone removing and replacing it with an upgraded chip.
The size difference between an intel CPU (in the OP's post) and the ram inside a phone is pretty extreme.
It would be better to simply upgrade to a better phone. Not only would you get more ram but a better cpu, higher capacity ROM, and who knows what.
Besides, where are you going to find a larger RAM chip to upgrade to? Cannibalize it from another better phone?
New nexus 10 user here. came from an htc flyer. Anyways, android assistant shows total ram on my device as 1.2gb or so. Specs say thing has 2gb. Does any ones else's device report that or is that the way android assitant reports it? I am just wondering if i have a new device with ram issues. Also, with not much running, this things shows available ram like my Vivid (about 300gb or so ) and it is supposed to have 2x the amount of Ram.
Thanks for any insight.
Sent from my Nexus 10 using Tapatalk 2
What your seeing is correct. The Nexus 10 has 2GB of RAM on the motherboard, but 800MB of it is reserved specifically for the GPU. I still think it's kind of cheap marketing, but meh.
Before 4.2.2, only close to 400MB was reserved for the GPU, but apparently you could go past that limit in some cases, and it would cause userspace RAM fragmentation.
espionage724 said:
What your seeing is correct. The Nexus 10 has 2GB of RAM on the motherboard, but 800MB of it is reserved specifically for the GPU. I still think it's kind of cheap marketing, but meh.
Before 4.2.2, only close to 400MB was reserved for the GPU, but apparently you could go past that limit in some cases, and it would cause userspace RAM fragmentation.
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Click to collapse
You could copy that everytime a new user asks about this ram "issue", which isn't, since I saw you answered like 7 times? the same thing.
espionage724 said:
What your seeing is correct. The Nexus 10 has 2GB of RAM on the motherboard, but 800MB of it is reserved specifically for the GPU. I still think it's kind of cheap marketing, but meh.
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Not cheap marketing, laptop manufacturers have been doing this for ages with integrated video cards. It's a little deceptive but it's the norm for this. I the Galaxy Nexus also did it. I am not certain but I don't think any mobile device has dedicated video ram, I believe it just is not reported as missing.
The Galaxy Nexus shows as having 893mb of ram.
Sent from my Nexus 10 using Tapatalk HD
lKBZl said:
You could copy that everytime a new user asks about this ram "issue", which isn't, since I saw you answered like 7 times? the same thing.
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Is there a problem with how I'm describing it? The Nexus 10 does have 2GB of RAM, with close to 800MB (I forget the exact amount but I know I reported it before) being reserved strictly for the GPU, and not userspace apps. I know it's not an "issue", but how I feel about it doesn't really mean too much at all though.
altimax98 said:
Not cheap marketing, laptop manufacturers have been doing this for ages with integrated video cards. It's a little deceptive but it's the norm for this. I the Galaxy Nexus also did it. I am not certain but I don't think any mobile device has dedicated video ram, I believe it just is not reported as missing.
The Galaxy Nexus shows as having 893mb of ram.
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I agree it's kind of normal, but it's how much is missing that still bothers me. The Galaxy Nexus is said to have 1GB of RAM, and if what you say is true, you're missing only a tiny bit over 100MB (which, is nothing imo). The Nexus 10 on the other hand is missing nearly half the advertised amount (not literally "missing" but not usable under normal conditions).
I'm pretty sure most laptop GPU's don't take "that" much RAM either when it's not dedicated (most I've seen was 512MB shared video memory, on laptops containing 4GB of RAM; very small amount really)
espionage724 said:
What your seeing is correct. The Nexus 10 has 2GB of RAM on the motherboard, but 800MB of it is reserved specifically for the GPU. I still think it's kind of cheap marketing, but meh.
Before 4.2.2, only close to 400MB was reserved for the GPU, but apparently you could go past that limit in some cases, and it would cause userspace RAM fragmentation.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
the more i know and read about the n10 the more i feel being ripped off
Ripped of? For around $400-$500, you're getting a device with extremely high resolution (highest in its class EVER), a 1.7 GHz CPU with up to 2.1 possible, a software and hardware support guarantee from Google, an extremely competitive GPU, and future-proofing with the latest Android versions for years to come.
That sounds like a pretty damn good deal to me. I know I've loved my N10.
If you're having issues with your device its likely a manufacturing fault, just return it to Google and get a new one.
Sent from my Nexus 10 using XDA Premium HD app
hpl912 said:
the more i know and read about the n10 the more i feel being ripped off
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Click to collapse
Rip off?
Have you checked how much usable space you have after formatting a 1GB drive? The N10 delivers the specified HW but there is always overhead required to use it, no matter which OS you have. That is just a fact of computing. I would argue that you get to use ALL of the N10 hardware when you accurately account for the a running OS and apps.
Compared to Win8 RT, Android (Linux) is a skinny fashion model. Go look at the Win8 RT tablet specs then see how much usable HW is left after it boots up. Here is just one example.
espionage724 said:
Is there a problem with how I'm describing it? The Nexus 10 does have 2GB of RAM, with close to 800MB (I forget the exact amount but I know I reported it before) being reserved strictly for the GPU, and not userspace apps. I know it's not an "issue", but how I feel about it doesn't really mean too much at all though.
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Click to collapse
Lol why do you take it like this? I just said you answered a lot of times the same, and you could copy it since i'm sure you'll have to answer that again' Where's the problem?
espionage724 said:
Is there a problem with how I'm describing it? The Nexus 10 does have 2GB of RAM, with close to 800MB (I forget the exact amount but I know I reported it before) being reserved strictly for the GPU, and not userspace apps. I know it's not an "issue", but how I feel about it doesn't really mean too much at all though.
I agree it's kind of normal, but it's how much is missing that still bothers me. The Galaxy Nexus is said to have 1GB of RAM, and if what you say is true, you're missing only a tiny bit over 100MB (which, is nothing imo). The Nexus 10 on the other hand is missing nearly half the advertised amount (not literally "missing" but not usable under normal conditions).
I'm pretty sure most laptop GPU's don't take "that" much RAM either when it's not dedicated (most I've seen was 512MB shared video memory, on laptops containing 4GB of RAM; very small amount really)
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I stand corrected about the Galaxy Nexus. It reports at 693 available ram.
Sent from my Nexus 10 using Tapatalk HD
Hello,
I just bought a nexus 10 and I have a question about the RAM amount. It's supposed to have 2GB of RAM but in my device it show only 1.23GB....
Is it normal? In my nexus 4 it shows 1.83GB.
Thanks and best regards.
Forget it. I just read that 800MB from the RAM are reserved for the GPU. Like a ****ing laptop...
Uhh...
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=40030815
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2204404
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2146679
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2146554
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2008146
Edit: took me too long haha
the_boo said:
Uhh...
Edit: took me too long haha
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank you very much for your time.
2 gb = big lie from manufactures
400 mb = true
Sent from my Nexus 10 using xda app-developers app
samwheat said:
2 gb = big lie from manufactures
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Click to collapse
Not really. They are telling the truth that there is 2GB of RAM installed. Just hate that almost half of it isn't usable by the intended purpose...
Should of just thrown 2.8GB of RAM on the board and gave 800MB directly to the GPU.
It isnt just the Nexus 10 that has this shared memory, most phones and tablets do. There are specific chipsets that have their own dedicated vram, like Tegra 3. Having dedicated vram chips has to do with how the memory controller is designed in the chipset architecture.
The Nexus 10 is suppose to have "2GB" of ram, but my Nexus 10 only have "1099"
The Nexus 10 is suppose to have "2GB" of ram, but my Nexus 10 only have "1099"
what is problem?
android 5.1.1
Round it up and it's 2gb
Mine is also showing 1GB of Ram and its runs slow. Is it supposed to have 2?
Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk
In later software releases, they decided to allocate more of the ram to the video. Search this forum for a more detailed answer if interested.
Sent from my Nexus 6 using Tapatalk
if i recall correctly, about 900mb is reserved for the gpu.
veitograf said:
if i recall correctly, about 900mb is reserved for the gpu.
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Click to collapse
I remember finding this out a few years ago and being pretty upset at the time. The tablet advertises 2GB of RAM, and yet about 1GB of it is only usable for the expected advertising purpose.
It's like me advertising my computer has 12GB of RAM, meanwhile, 4GB of that is dedicated to the GPU (which on it's own isn't really a problem, but it would make more sense to advertise 8GB)
Even then it would still be 12GB.
Let me get a little technical.
If you have an APU based PC, the GPU is on the same die as the processor. So when you use the GPU portion of the APU, it will use the RAM. How much? It depends on the load.
You can still use all of it though, so it isn't a problem. When you aren't using the GPU, all of your RAM is available.