4GB RAM on 32bit OS

Today I inserted 4GB DDR2 RAM into my hp8510p laptop. 

BIOS and CPU-Z can detect 4GB physical RAM.

Windows XP SP3 can only recognize 3GB.

Someone explained the reason in a post - 

4 GB RAM in Windows XP

Ubuntu oneiric 32bit version can only use about 3GB too. 

onega@ub-laptop:~/boost_1_48_0$ free -m
             total       used       free     shared    buffers     cached
Mem:          3025       2502        523          0        594        910
-/+ buffers/cache:        997       2028
Swap:         2047          0       2047