Virtual Server and Windows /3GB switch

Ever since I put up a virtual machine to running TFS (Team Foundation Server), performance on the host machine has been sluggish and windows take forever to refresh. Even though it reports 1GB still remains free (out of the 2.25GB). I have decided to put down money to install another 2GB in due time, but only after the Taiwanese come back to work and process my order and deliver next month.

I have a question though. I suppose Virtual Server is by and large still considered an "application" and thus does not make use of the other 2GB of kernel addressing. I am wondering what are the consequences/effects of making my host server run with the /3GB option? Before as well as after I plug in another 2GB of real RAM?

Anybody else do alot of virtual machine development inside Windows 2003 and face similar memory contention challenges?

I'm running 4gb 64-bit machine, quite ok for me... I tried running up to 4 virtual machines, and still running quite ok. I didnt'use the 3gb option though. I make the bios detect the 4gb first, before booting to 64-bit os...

Raymond Chen gives out a good spread of explanations about the /3GB switch. Anybody considering memory performance should have a read.

Well blow me down! I got smacked on the back of the head today to learn that a 32-bit x86 machine cannot really address complete 4GB of RAM! Will be interesting to try and figure out to reclaim that lost 400MB....