2 or 4GB memory?

[Jo-Anne]

I'm about to buy a notebook computer with the Vista downgrade to Windows XP
Pro. A friend whose judgment I normally trust says I'll never need more than
the 2.0GB memory that comes with the computer. I can upgrade to 4.0GB,
however, for an extra $150. I do a lot of net surfing, emailing, and
word-processing now. I will probably want to watch DVDs on the computer. And
I want to be able to use this computer for a long time, including adding
software periodically. (I have 512MB memory on my 5-year-old Dell desktop
computer. I think it was the maximum I could get at the time. That computer
is still chugging along, but it may be nearing the end of its lifespan.)

I don't mind splurging if it'll keep the computer up-to-date for a longer
time.

So...should I follow my friend's recommendation, or should I go for the
maximum amount of memory?

Thank you!

Jo-Anne

 

[Shenan Stanley]

I'm about to buy a notebook computer with the Vista downgrade to
Windows XP Pro. A friend whose judgment I normally trust says I'll
never need more than the 2.0GB memory that comes with the computer.
I can upgrade to 4.0GB, however, for an extra $150. I do a lot of
net surfing, emailing, and word-processing now. I will probably
want to watch DVDs on the computer. And I want to be able to use
this computer for a long time, including adding software
periodically. (I have 512MB memory on my 5-year-old Dell desktop
computer. I think it was the maximum I could get at the time. That
computer is still chugging along, but it may be nearing the end of
its lifespan.)
I don't mind splurging if it'll keep the computer up-to-date for a
longer time.

So...should I follow my friend's recommendation, or should I go for
the maximum amount of memory?

Given what you have - it is highly unlikely that with Windows XP SP3, you
will even use 768MB (probably not even 512MB) at any point. If you plan on
putting Vista back on it - 2+GB is recommended.

 

[Jo-Anne]

Thank you, Shenan! That makes me a lot more comfortable with my friend's
advice. I can't imagine considering Vista. My hope is that the new (and
better than Vista) OS will be available before I need to get yet another new
computer.

Jo-Anne

 

[GreenieLeBrun]

Thank you, Shenan! That makes me a lot more comfortable with my
friend's advice. I can't imagine considering Vista. My hope is that
the new (and better than Vista) OS will be available before I need to
get yet another new computer.

Jo-Anne

Given what you have - it is highly unlikely that with Windows XP
SP3, you will even use 768MB (probably not even 512MB) at any point.
If you plan on putting Vista back on it - 2+GB is recommended.

And further to what Shenen said, even if you did put 4Gb in XP would only be
able to use between ~3.2 - 3.5Gb for its own use.

Why not the full 4Gb? Because XP (32bit) reserves some of the upper memory
for device drivers. To use 4Gb or more you would need to use a 64bit
operating system.

Use the $150 to purchase an external hard drive for backing up your data.

 

[Jo-Anne]

Thank you, Shenan! That makes me a lot more comfortable with my
friend's advice. I can't imagine considering Vista. My hope is that
the new (and better than Vista) OS will be available before I need to
get yet another new computer.

Jo-Anne



And further to what Shenen said, even if you did put 4Gb in XP would only
be able to use between ~3.2 - 3.5Gb for its own use.

Why not the full 4Gb? Because XP (32bit) reserves some of the upper memory
for device drivers. To use 4Gb or more you would need to use a 64bit
operating system.

Use the $150 to purchase an external hard drive for backing up your data.

Thank you! I already have two 160GB USB drives for just this purpose--and
the cost was indeed about $150 for both.

Jo-Anne

 

[Mike Morrow]

I just upgraded a DELL to 4 GB of memory. I only get 3.24 GB reported in the Computer>Properties window and DELL then reports, with their utility, that only 2.6 GB is available. Goodness what I drop from 4 GB!!! I begin to understand why the drop to 3.2 but where is the next 600 MB going on this DELL Inspiron 530?

 

[Malke]

I just upgraded a DELL to 4 GB of memory. I only get 3.24 GB reported in
the Computer>Properties window and DELL then reports, with their utility,
that only 2.6 GB is available. Goodness what I drop from 4 GB!!! I begin
to understand why the drop to 3.2 but where is the next 600 MB going on
this DELL Inspiron 530?

"DELL then reports, with their utility" - what utility? What shows up in
Windows after you get what you think is a "drop"? What kind of memory did
you use? Did you install matched pairs?

http://crucial.com/store/listparts.aspx?model=Inspiron 530

Malke

 

[Mike Hall - MVP]

"DELL then reports, with their utility" - what utility? What shows up in
Windows after you get what you think is a "drop"? What kind of memory did
you use? Did you install matched pairs?

http://crucial.com/store/listparts.aspx?model=Inspiron 530

Malke

32bit allows 4gb to be ADDRESSED.

The system hardware itself is part of the 4gb total.

Some systems hardware takes up more of the 4gb than others..

After having taken off the system amount, Windows then uses RAM to maintain
whatever is running, hence the drop.

--
Mike Hall - MVP
How to construct a good post..
http://dts-l.com/goodpost.htm
How to use the Microsoft Product Support Newsgroups..
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?pr=newswhelp&style=toc
Mike's Window - My Blog..
http://msmvps.com/blogs/mikehall/default.aspx

 

[Paul]

I just upgraded a DELL to 4 GB of memory. I only get 3.24 GB reported in the
Computer>Properties window and DELL then reports, with their utility, that
only 2.6 GB is available. Goodness what I drop from 4 GB!!! I begin to
understand why the drop to 3.2 but where is the next 600 MB going on this
DELL Inspiron 530?

The best resource I can find so far, is go to Device Manager, and set
View to "Resources by Type". You'll see a Memory entry in the lower
pane. Expanding that shows a resource map for the system. It doesn't
provide a rationale, but gives raw data to work with.

Memory Usage Summary:
[00000000 - 0009FFFF] System board
[000A0000 - 000BFFFF] PCI bus
[000A0000 - 000BFFFF] Intel(R) 82875P Processor to AGP Controller - 2579
[000A0000 - 000BFFFF] RADEON 9800 PRO
[000C0000 - 000DFFFF] System board
[000E0000 - 000FFFFF] System board
[00100000 - 7FFEFFFF] System board
[80000000 - FFEFFFFF] PCI bus
[CFE00000 - EFDFFFFF] Intel(R) 82875P Processor to AGP Controller - 2579
[D8000000 - DFFFFFFF] RADEON 9800 PRO - Secondary
[E0000000 - E7FFFFFF] RADEON 9800 PRO
[EFEFE000 - EFEFEFFF] Hauppauge WinTV 878/9 WDM Video Driver
[EFEFF000 - EFEFFFFF] Hauppauge WinTV 878/9 WDM Aux Driver
[F4000000 - F7FFFFFF] Intel(R) 82875P Processor to AGP Controller - 2579
[FE900000 - FE9FFFFF] Intel(R) 82875P Processor to AGP Controller - 2579
[FE9E0000 - FE9EFFFF] RADEON 9800 PRO - Secondary
[FE9F0000 - FE9FFFFF] RADEON 9800 PRO
[FEA00000 - FEAFFFFF] Intel(R) 82875P/E7210 Processor to PCI to CSA bridge - 257B
[FEAE0000 - FEAFFFFF] Intel(R) PRO/1000 CT Network Connection
[FEBFFC00 - FEBFFFFF] Intel(R) 82801EB USB2 Enhanced Host Controller - 24DD
[FEC00000 - FEC00FFF] Motherboard resources
[FED20000 - FED8FFFF] Motherboard resources
[FEE00000 - FEE00FFF] Motherboard resources
[FFB00000 - FFBFFFFF] Motherboard resources
[FFEFFC00 - FFEFFFFF] Intel(R) 82801EB Ultra ATA Storage Controllers
[FFF00000 - FFFFFFFF] System board

I obtained the above Device Manager output, by doing a "print" of the
Device Manager screen, and then copy/paste from the print file created
on my C: drive.

My video card is 128MB and supports two monitors maximum. Using Everest
and its DirectXirectX_Video tab, my available local video memory is
declared as 128MB and available non-local video memory is 55263KB. The
latter number suggests my BIOS AGP aperture is set to 64MB (and without
rebooting and checking it, that is what I remember seeing it set to).
None of that compares well to the numbers above.

A system with PCI Express doesn't have an AGP aperture, but on some systems
the BIOS maps PCI Express video twice. (I've seen early BIOS that set up
a cached and a non-cached space for video.) So YMMV, as your system is
a different generation and architecture than mine. Since your system is
a relatively recent PCI Express system, the BIOS probably doesn't map the
video quite the same, wasteful way.

A possible reason for the generous address map allocations in my system,
is the number of busses perceived to be present in the system. There is a
minimum size the BIOS allocates address space for each bus and devices on
it, which is not related to the resources the cards actually uses. For example,
if a PCI card needed 5 bytes of address map, the BIOS would still allocate
a minimum of 256MB to the PCI bus. If you needed 257MB, the BIOS would
give the bus a 512MB address space. Something like that. Since the
above system only has 2GB of memory present, it isn't possible to
draw any conclusions (as the map isn't "full" and the BIOS can be
sloppy if it wants).

I have no idea what a "Dell Utility" tells you

Task Manager (control-alt-delete) gives some information about available
memory, in the Performance section.

HTH,
Paul