We recently upgraded our database server to 48 GB of memory -- because hardware is cheap, and programmers are expensive.

Imagine our surprise, then, when we rebooted the server and saw only 32 GB of memory available in Windows Server 2008. Did we install the memory wrong? No, the BIOS screen reported the full 48 GB of memory. In fact, the system information applet even reports 48 GB of memory:

But there's only 32 GB of usable memory in the system, somehow.

Did you feel that? A great disturbance in the Force, as if 17,179,869,184 bytes cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced. It's so profoundly sad.

That's when I began to suspect the real culprit: weasels.

No. Not the cute weasels. I'm referring to angry, evil marketing weasels.

Yes, the experience is exactly as pictured. We are using Windows Server 2008 Standard edition. Which has been arbitrarily limited to 32 GB of memory. Why? So the marketing weasels can segment the market.

It's sort of like if you were all set to buy that new merino wool sweater, and you thought it was going to cost $70, which is well wo