Vista, BTS, NVIDIA Quadro, Thinkpad R61, disable "Shared System Memory"

I can't seem to find the answer, though I have seen the question posted a couple of times.

I want to try to disable the "Shared System Memory" (hypermemory or whatever it is called) and thereby forcing my graphic card to use its dedicated Video Memory.

Can that be done? I've looked several places, such as in the BIOS and the NVIDIA control panel, the setting and the properties, but can't seem to find anything there.


Some of my system specs:

Thinkpad R61
Vista, 32 bit
NVIDIA Quadro NVS 140M
Dedicated Video Memory: 128 MB
RAM: 4 GB (same results with 3 GB)

Currently running 174.20 driver from laptopvideo2go.com but I've tried with 8 different drivers now, all giving more or less the same result.

I've also tryed eg. memtest86.com but no found errors there.

Mostly I am playing CIV IV, BtS, and sometimes I receive a message where the program shuts down due to: Memory allocation failure - exiting program. Reason: bad allocation. The pc only exits to Vista, doesn't shut down. I've changed settings in the game, which helped some.

Based on the history in the task manager I can see that breakdowns happens only when using above 2 GB of RAM. I suspect that it is due to the Shared System Memory - hope there is someone who can help me disable it, so that I can rule it out, or have other ideas.

 

Hmm...It seems like it might be because you are using a 32-bit operating system. It has problems using more than 3 GB of RAM. Have you tried using it in a 64-bit OS? That might correct your problem with "Shared System Memory"

 

I seriously doubt its hypermemory causing that, in fact I believe that doesnt even work in vista. Vista uses its own memory sharing scheme, and its dynamic, as is turbocache and hyper memory, it uses the dedicated meory first till that runs out, no need to force anything. When running 4gb or higher its reccomended to use a 64bit OS.

For the game issue, are all patches installed? Have you tried OS compatability modes?

 

Well, I've tried using 1, 2, 3 and 4 GB of RAM - all giving the same result - after some while the game runs dead with the mentioned error.

I know that Vista uses the dedicated first, and then jumps on the rest. But for testing it would be good check IF that is the problem.

My game is as patched as it can be, so unfortunately no help there - and writing Firaxis about the problem gives nothing...

I have also tried other OS-compatibilty modes, but that was before i learned about changing the drivers. Will give it a try again.

I haven't tried af 64 bit though, but I am beginning to consider switching to XP. Are there other differences between 32 and 64 bit XP other than the RAM part?