mike brannigan [msft]

Maximum performance is achieved with the maximum amount of addressable
memory installed.
This is 4Gb for the 32-bit Windows XP. (subject to hardware limits on your
mother board)
The "more is better" rule applies to Windows XP

--
Regards,

Mike
--
Mike Brannigan [Microsoft]

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no
rights

Please note I cannot respond to e-mailed questions.
Please use these newsgroups
"KWA" <junkmail@junkmail.com> wrote in message news:lPALa.6326$xv.4368@fe3.columbus.rr.com...

kwa

Great info. Thanks a lot to all of you who replied!

Keith

chris simpson

I am getting by on 256 MB... I would say 512 would be ideal....

lil ol me

I have 512mb and was able to turn the swap file off 4 months ago with no
problems at all. I'd feel more comfortable with a little more just in case,
but I REALLY hate swap files!

I even tried 256mb without the swap file but I couldn't quite load the
Unreal Tournament 2003 demo! And I think 3d mark 2001 got about half-way
before bailing out.

128mb? I couldn't even load the control panel, which makes me wonder how XP
loaded at all!

That's all on XP Pro BTW.

jk

Not really, as unused ram in of no benefit, and just wasted money.
For many people, 512 meg is fine. If you work with large data,
or have many applications opened at once, you might want
to get a gig of ram. Above a gig and a half of ram(3 512 meg sticks)
additional ram gets very expensive(1 gig sticks of ram are now around
four times the price of 512 meg sticks), and the extra ram doesn't
even benefit the vast majority of users. For a budget system I usually
recommend 512 meg of ram, and for a higher end system (or if
you plan to run Photoshop with large images), I recommend a
gig of ram.

john smith

I have 512, use alot of graphic packages and find I often have 200 MB free.
I just built a couple of PCs for friends and they wanted 1GB in the System
but Task Manager often shows 800MB free...

In normal use I think 512 is enough. If you are doing really, really
intensive stuff like digital editing, loads of Photoshop or animation work
then you will see a benefit in having more but... depends on what you are
doing really.


J.

)-()-(

I also have 512mb and no swap file. Mainly surf, and play games.
I think the optimal amount is enough to run the applications you use AND turn
off the swap file.
The system will be quicker all around. XP Home here.

phisherman

It depends on what you are doing--graphics work will benefit more with
lots of RAM. I'd recommend 512MB for most applications. XP is RAM
hungry.

~misfit~

Very true.
--
~misfit~

==================

AMD Athlon XP1800+ T'bred 'B' core @ 1950Mhz. Standard HSF and vcore.


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steve

In article <vncvfvcq77f55ghvenhhjujjiq7f69ra21@4ax.com>,
nobody@noone.com says...

I've got a dual boot system with W2K Pro and XP Pro so it's easy for me
to compare performance.

Now I know I really need to get more RAM but at present I am only using
256 megs.

On performance and memory usage W2K pro wins hands down with my current
setup.

I would suggest at least 512 megs to gain the max out of XP.
--
regards,
Steve
"The greatest of all faults is to be conscious of none"
remove NOSPAM for reply