I have one GB of PC3200 DDR SDRAM installed now on XP Pro system. I am a
hard core gamer and wonder is it worth it to add another 1GB stick?

System is:

P4 3.06 GHz cpu HT
eVGA GeForce 6800 Ultra
3 HDD's - two Ultra 160 SCSI's, one ATA 100
Audigy 2ZS Sound Card
480 watt Thermaltake PSU
Sony GD-520P 21" flat monitor
Plextor CDRW 52x

"Steve Marshall" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote...
>I have one GB of PC3200 DDR SDRAM installed now on XP Pro system. I am a hard
>core gamer and wonder is it worth it to add another 1GB stick?

Do your games access the pagefile excessively? If not, 1 GB should be plenty,
unless you run background programs while gaming.

If you want to have your memory take full advantage of its DDR function two
sticks are required. DDR (Dual Data Rate) will only function in Single Data
Rate mode with one stick. Two sticks should increase throughput.

"Steve Marshall" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:%(E-Mail Removed)...
>I have one GB of PC3200 DDR SDRAM installed now on XP Pro system. I am a
>hard core gamer and wonder is it worth it to add another 1GB stick?
>
> System is:
>
> P4 3.06 GHz cpu HT
> eVGA GeForce 6800 Ultra
> 3 HDD's - two Ultra 160 SCSI's, one ATA 100
> Audigy 2ZS Sound Card
> 480 watt Thermaltake PSU
> Sony GD-520P 21" flat monitor
> Plextor CDRW 52x

I am going to assume that you have 2-512meg sticks of that DDR Ram to make that 1gig, or it wouldn't work Dual Data Rate (DDR), rather in single mode. If your only doing gaming, and nothing too intense in the background you should be good. But another gig wouldn't hurt, and PC3200 DDR is fairly cheap now. You will have to match RAM to almost exactly, or XP will probably complain.

"Steve Marshall" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message news:%(E-Mail Removed)...
>I have one GB of PC3200 DDR SDRAM installed now on XP Pro system. I am a
> hard core gamer and wonder is it worth it to add another 1GB stick?
>
> System is:
>
> P4 3.06 GHz cpu HT
> eVGA GeForce 6800 Ultra
> 3 HDD's - two Ultra 160 SCSI's, one ATA 100
> Audigy 2ZS Sound Card
> 480 watt Thermaltake PSU
> Sony GD-520P 21" flat monitor
> Plextor CDRW 52x

1GB RAM is plenty, invest in a faster processor, games love faster
processors and can't get enough speed.

"Steve Marshall" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:%(E-Mail Removed)...
>I have one GB of PC3200 DDR SDRAM installed now on XP Pro system. I am a
>hard core gamer and wonder is it worth it to add another 1GB stick?
>
> System is:
>
> P4 3.06 GHz cpu HT
> eVGA GeForce 6800 Ultra
> 3 HDD's - two Ultra 160 SCSI's, one ATA 100
> Audigy 2ZS Sound Card
> 480 watt Thermaltake PSU
> Sony GD-520P 21" flat monitor
> Plextor CDRW 52x

Interesting point - what are my cpu upgrade options on a 478 pin
Gigabyte GA-8S648-L Mobo?

Also, it is one stick of 1GB PC 3200 DDR SDRAM.

Steve

Gary wrote:
> 1GB RAM is plenty, invest in a faster processor, games love faster
> processors and can't get enough speed.
>
> "Steve Marshall" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
> news:%(E-Mail Removed)...
>
>>I have one GB of PC3200 DDR SDRAM installed now on XP Pro system. I am a
>>hard core gamer and wonder is it worth it to add another 1GB stick?
>>
>>System is:
>>
>>P4 3.06 GHz cpu HT
>>eVGA GeForce 6800 Ultra
>>3 HDD's - two Ultra 160 SCSI's, one ATA 100
>>Audigy 2ZS Sound Card
>>480 watt Thermaltake PSU
>>Sony GD-520P 21" flat monitor
>>Plextor CDRW 52x
>
>
>

Steve Marshall <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:

>I have one GB of PC3200 DDR SDRAM installed now on XP Pro system. I am a
>hard core gamer and wonder is it worth it to add another 1GB stick?
>

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

Unfortunately there is no ready way of determing actual paging file
usage provided with Windows XP - it does not have an equivalent to the
'Memory Manager - Swap File In Use" reporting provided by the System
Monitor utility in Windows 95/98/Me.

There is a free utility that you can download and run which will
provide this information for you. It was written by MVP Bill James and
you can get if from
http://www.dougknox.com/xp/utils/xp_pagefilemon.htm or from
http://billsway.com/notes_public/WinXP_Tweaks/

If that utility shows actual page file usage of 50 mb or more on a
regular basis then that is indicative of fairly significant paging
file activity. Adding more RAM will reduce or even eliminate entirely
this activity thereby improving performance.

This apples regardless of how much or how little RAM is currently
installed in the computer, at least up to the 4 gb RAM maximum for
Windows XP.

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."

Nice link - it works great. I will check it out as time goes by and see
what my max. page file usage is.

Steve


Ron Martell wrote:
> Steve Marshall <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>
>
>>I have one GB of PC3200 DDR SDRAM installed now on XP Pro system. I am a
>>hard core gamer and wonder is it worth it to add another 1GB stick?
>>
>
>
> Adding more memory can noticeably improve performance only if the
> added memory results in reduced usage of the virtual memory paging
> file. Therefore if the paging file is not currently being used to any
> significant extent then adding more memory will not provide a
> significant improvement.
>
> Unfortunately there is no ready way of determing actual paging file
> usage provided with Windows XP - it does not have an equivalent to the
> 'Memory Manager - Swap File In Use" reporting provided by the System
> Monitor utility in Windows 95/98/Me.
>
> There is a free utility that you can download and run which will
> provide this information for you. It was written by MVP Bill James and
> you can get if from
> http://www.dougknox.com/xp/utils/xp_pagefilemon.htm or from
> http://billsway.com/notes_public/WinXP_Tweaks/
>
> If that utility shows actual page file usage of 50 mb or more on a
> regular basis then that is indicative of fairly significant paging
> file activity. Adding more RAM will reduce or even eliminate entirely
> this activity thereby improving performance.
>
> This apples regardless of how much or how little RAM is currently
> installed in the computer, at least up to the 4 gb RAM maximum for
> Windows XP.
>
> Good luck
>
>
> Ron Martell Duncan B.C. Canada

Ron Martell:

Just played a game (Half Life 2) for a while and my max. page file usage
was 97MB with a custom page file of 1534MB on non-OS drive.

Does that qualify?

Steve



Steve Marshall wrote:
> Nice link - it works great. I will check it out as time goes by and see
> what my max. page file usage is.
>
> >
>
> Ron Martell wrote:
>
>> Steve Marshall <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>>
>>
>>> I have one GB of PC3200 DDR SDRAM installed now on XP Pro system. I
>>> am a hard core gamer and wonder is it worth it to add another 1GB stick?
>>>
>>
>>
>> Adding more memory can noticeably improve performance only if the
>> added memory results in reduced usage of the virtual memory paging
>> file. Therefore if the paging file is not currently being used to any
>> significant extent then adding more memory will not provide a
>> significant improvement.
>>
>> Unfortunately there is no ready way of determing actual paging file
>> usage provided with Windows XP - it does not have an equivalent to the
>> 'Memory Manager - Swap File In Use" reporting provided by the System
>> Monitor utility in Windows 95/98/Me.
>>
>> There is a free utility that you can download and run which will
>> provide this information for you. It was written by MVP Bill James and
>> you can get if from
>> http://www.dougknox.com/xp/utils/xp_pagefilemon.htm or from
>> http://billsway.com/notes_public/WinXP_Tweaks/
>>
>> If that utility shows actual page file usage of 50 mb or more on a
>> regular basis then that is indicative of fairly significant paging
>> file activity. Adding more RAM will reduce or even eliminate entirely
>> this activity thereby improving performance.
>>
>> This apples regardless of how much or how little RAM is currently
>> installed in the computer, at least up to the 4 gb RAM maximum for
>> Windows XP.
>>
>> Good luck
>>
>>
>> Ron Martell Duncan B.C. Canada

If you onluy use 97MB of the page file, even when playing, I don't think
another 1GB memory will do anything for you, EXCEPT that you can then set up
dual channel memory (in BIOS), which will speed up memory access a few
percent..


--
Tumppi
Reply to group
=================================================
Most learned on nntp://news.mircosoft.com
Helsinki, Finland (remove _NOSPAM)
(translations from FI/SE not always accurate)
=================================================



"Steve Marshall" <(E-Mail Removed)> kirjoitti viestissä
news:%(E-Mail Removed)...
> Ron Martell:
>
> Just played a game (Half Life 2) for a while and my max. page file usage
> was 97MB with a custom page file of 1534MB on non-OS drive.
>
> Does that qualify?
>
> Steve
>
>
>
> Steve Marshall wrote:
> > Nice link - it works great. I will check it out as time goes by and see
> > what my max. page file usage is.
> >
> > >
> >
> > Ron Martell wrote:
> >
> >> Steve Marshall <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >>> I have one GB of PC3200 DDR SDRAM installed now on XP Pro system. I
> >>> am a hard core gamer and wonder is it worth it to add another 1GB
stick?
> >>>
> >>
> >>
> >> Adding more memory can noticeably improve performance only if the
> >> added memory results in reduced usage of the virtual memory paging
> >> file. Therefore if the paging file is not currently being used to any
> >> significant extent then adding more memory will not provide a
> >> significant improvement.
> >>
> >> Unfortunately there is no ready way of determing actual paging file
> >> usage provided with Windows XP - it does not have an equivalent to the
> >> 'Memory Manager - Swap File In Use" reporting provided by the System
> >> Monitor utility in Windows 95/98/Me.
> >>
> >> There is a free utility that you can download and run which will
> >> provide this information for you. It was written by MVP Bill James and
> >> you can get if from
> >> http://www.dougknox.com/xp/utils/xp_pagefilemon.htm or from
> >> http://billsway.com/notes_public/WinXP_Tweaks/
> >>
> >> If that utility shows actual page file usage of 50 mb or more on a
> >> regular basis then that is indicative of fairly significant paging
> >> file activity. Adding more RAM will reduce or even eliminate entirely
> >> this activity thereby improving performance.
> >>
> >> This apples regardless of how much or how little RAM is currently
> >> installed in the computer, at least up to the 4 gb RAM maximum for
> >> Windows XP.
> >>
> >> Good luck
> >>
> >>
> >> Ron Martell Duncan B.C. Canada