actually, I remember this now and it is incredibly stupid and money grabbing of Microsoft. While I understand a "home" user won't need more than 8GB, say I want to create my own at home research project that needs more than 16GB, why should I have to pay extra for "Professional" when it doesn't have anything I really need other than ram support. You should be paying Microsoft for more features (media center, or business features), not paying less for gimped code that cost them more to gimp than leave it fully open.

However, most people who do research don't use Windows anyways

I suspect the number of people who would fall into that grouping would be very small indeed. I suspect it has more to do with seperating the home user from the professional. They want to charge extra to businesses, they're not interested in creating an artificial barrier which nets them very little extra from the home market.

so you buy windows 8.

the OS alone may probably eat 8gb. :p

I always like to leave it to the professionals when it comes to "which graphics card should i get"

pow! http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-graphics-card,2521.html

Just pick a price you want to spend and see what you come up with.

No it can recognize a lot more then that....It's probably your motherboard capping it.

from http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa366778(VS.85).aspx <-- note the link is to microsoft's own site admitting this

The following specifies the limits on physical memory for Windows 7.

Starter 32-bit/64-bit = 2 GB

Home Basic 64-bit = 8 GB

Home Premium 64-bit = 16 GB

Professional/Enterprise/Ultimate 64-bit = 192 GB

Of course, the limit for any 32-bit system is 4 GB (though you will probably only see about 3.5 GB of that).  The exception is Windows Starter, which really screws over the customer.

I believe there is no reason for them to do this other than to get you to buy a more expensive edition of windows.

edit: I edited the table out when I realized it wouldn't fit. 

that table is for 32 bit windows, they are talking about 64 bit I believe

That chart is for 32 bit Windows. And that chart has nothing to do with Windows so much as it does the limitations of 32 bit operating systems.

One of the main reasons for upgrading to a 64 bit OS, whether XP or Vista was to address more memory for applications that required it.

The only reason for using dated a dated 32 bit OS is for full compatibility with older software that has not received updates.

The chart was too long, so it only showed the 32-bit values. I changed my post to display the 64-bit RAM limits, and you will see the entire chart through the link.

somebody is proud of there PC. nice picture lol