RAM

[Cliff]

I have a Pentium 4 with Windows XP and 512mb of Ram.
Would performance suffer if I upgraded to 1 gig of RAM?
Is there such a thing as too much RAM?

[Jim Macklin]

You might notice a very small increase in speed doing normal
computer applications, biggest jump is 128 to 256, a smaller
jump from 256 to 512 and unless you are doing large files,
video editing or running many programs at one time, you
won't notice the difference.

But it won't hurt anything except your pocketbook by $100.


"Cliff" > wrote in message
...
| I have a Pentium 4 with Windows XP and 512mb of Ram.
| Would performance suffer if I upgraded to 1 gig of RAM?
| Is there such a thing as too much RAM?

[Peter R. Fletcher]

You can't be too rich or have too much RAM! In both cases, however,
there is a law of diminishing returns.

On Mon, 19 May 2003 22:09:30 -0700, "Cliff" > wrote:

>I have a Pentium 4 with Windows XP and 512mb of Ram.
>Would performance suffer if I upgraded to 1 gig of RAM?
>Is there such a thing as too much RAM?



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[Ron Martell]

"Cliff" > wrote:

>I have a Pentium 4 with Windows XP and 512mb of Ram.
>Would performance suffer if I upgraded to 1 gig of RAM?
>Is there such a thing as too much RAM?

Adding more memory can noticeably improve performance if the added
memory results in reduced usage of the virtual memory paging file.
Therefore if the paging file is not being used to any significant
extent then adding more memory will not provide a significant
improvement.

This applies regardless of how much or how little RAM is currently
installed in the computer, at least for memory quantities up to 3 gb.

Download the free paging file usage reporting utility from
http://www.dougknox.com/xp/utils/xp_pagefilemon.htm or from
http://billsway.com/notes_public/WinXP_Tweaks/ and install it.

If it shows your actual page file usage at 50 mb or higher on a
regular basis then it is quite likely that adding more RAM will
provide some performance benefits. However with 50 mb or less of
actual page file usage the benefit from additional RAM is not likely
to be noticeable except by running a series of timed benchmark tests.

Good luck



Ron Martell Duncan B.C. Canada
--
Microsoft MVP
On-Line Help Computer Service
http://onlinehelp.bc.ca

"The reason computer chips are so small is computers don't eat much."