Since the restriction is on physical RAM, and given the point in the boot process when I believe the check happens, I don't think the OP has anything to worry about: some RAM will get hoisted out of the way of the DMA devices (most notably the video card) so the memory map will extend out past 16GB, but that RAM will still be available and used by Windows Home since it still totals no more than 16GB. I don't actually have a system handy to verify that (I have a 16GB machine but it's running Pro) but if anybody happens to have this configuration already (16GB, W7HP, and a discrete video card) they can use a variety of utilities (eg
SysInternals' RamMap) to check.
Chrispy_ wrote:These will be the same OEM's that shipped 32-bit Windows 7 on 4GB machines?
Hey, they got around to it eventually.
Actually, that wasn't a precisely analogous situation, since switching to 64bit Windows had a huge train of implications for the OEMs in terms of supported hardware, drivers, and so on. If Windows 8 Home raises the RAM limit, the OEMs don't have to do anything to support it (assuming they've moved on to motherboards that support more than 16GB and actually offer configurations with that much RAM). In the meantime, they can always steer people to 7 Pro.