adding memory to a netbook

[Jo-Anne]

A friend bought a Windows 7 netbook, added 1 gigabyte of memory, and says
the computer runs much faster. I'm wondering if adding a gigabyte of memory
to my WinXP netbook would accomplish anything. (Both netbooks came with 1
gigabyte of memory.)

Thank you!

Jo-Anne

 

[VanguardLH]

A friend bought a Windows 7 netbook, added 1 gigabyte of memory, and says
the computer runs much faster. I'm wondering if adding a gigabyte of memory
to my WinXP netbook would accomplish anything. (Both netbooks came with 1
gigabyte of memory.)

His ran faster because he was consuming more memory space than he had
for physical memory so he had to use more pagefile space (which is a
file on the hard disk which is obviously a lot slower to access than
system RAM). Whether or not your setup would speed up depends on
whether or not you are using more memory space than you have for
physical system RAM. Do you? What does Task Manager show under its
Performance tab?

If you aren't using up all the physical RAM that you already have then
adding more just means there will be more unused physical memory.
Unused physical memory is wasted memory and only considered as a reserve
should you start loading more concurrent processes. Load you typical
suite of programs that you load concurrently during you use of your host
and then see if you've exceeded the physical memory in your host. Some
programs will suck up as much memory as they can get (up to the 2GB user
memory space available to a normal application) but you never mention
what programs you run, like video editing which can use a lot of memory.

If you only have a single 1GB stick inside your host then it's possible
that adding another matching 1GB stick will speed up your host but the
speedup is more likely detectable by benchmarks than what you will see
in the actual use of your host. This is because dual-channel mode may
get engaged when you pair up the memory modules. That might give you
8-17% increase in a benchmark for memory but it's likely you won't
notice any change in the real-world use of your host. The problem is
that you may already have two 512MB sticks in your host and there are
only 2 slots, so going from 1GB to 2GB means you would have to discard
the old 512MB modules and insert two new 1GB modules. Instead of
increasing your memory, you would have to replace it which means you are
tossing the value of that old memory for which you don't know yet if you
have exceeded its capacity.

 

[Paul]

A friend bought a Windows 7 netbook, added 1 gigabyte of memory, and says
the computer runs much faster. I'm wondering if adding a gigabyte of memory
to my WinXP netbook would accomplish anything. (Both netbooks came with 1
gigabyte of memory.)

Thank you!

Jo-Anne

The memory usage characteristics of the two OSes are quite different.

Based on the feedback people have given in the past, once WinXP has
512MB or so, any more than that is purely at your discretion in terms
of making room for the number of applications you normally have
simultaneously open. If you were doing emailing and web browsing and
using one application at a time, even 512MB might be good enough for
that. (I think the WinXP computer I set up back home was like that - I
put 512MB in it, and it was acceptable with a small number of open
applications like a web browser and email. It wouldn't be that
happy a situation running Photoshop.)

Windows 7 on the other hand, loves to use memory in preparation for
your next move. So it's doing work speculatively, on your behalf.
(English translation - the OS does whatever it feels like...)
And a larger physical memory install helps with that. My Windows 7
laptop has 3GB, and I'd hate to see how slow it would be with
less memory.

Having more memory is hardly ever a bad thing (Windows 98 excepted).

But whether you'd be "wowed" by the impact of the extra memory, probably
not.

Only certain situations, would provide a partial justification
for your purchase. As an example, I changed this machine (WinXP) from
2GB to 4GB, and I'd have a hard time proving to people it was
a good usage of money. The only time it helps, is when I'm running
three virtual machines at the same time, and even then, the WinXP
memory management begins to suck when any more than 2.6GB is in usage.
(To prove that, I did an experiment where I moved the pagefile onto
a RAMDisk, and WinXP sailed through the 2.6GB point like melted butter.
So it has something to do with paging or memory management of some
sort. You can actually run WinXP with more than 4GB, and use the
excess with a software RAMDisk, such as this one. I put my pagefile
on one of these software RAMDisks. When I was using this, I had 6GB
installed RAM on a 32 bit OS, and the RAMDisk was set up to provide
2GB storage. I have since returned to the 4GB configuration and
having a single pagefile on C:.)

http://memory.dataram.com/products-and-services/software/ramdisk

Paul

 

[Leythos]

A friend bought a Windows 7 netbook, added 1 gigabyte of memory, and says
the computer runs much faster. I'm wondering if adding a gigabyte of memory
to my WinXP netbook would accomplish anything. (Both netbooks came with 1
gigabyte of memory.)

When XP first came out it would run well on 256MB RAM, then it was
512MB, but, as people and vendors have bloated their apps and continued
to run everything on their system without uninstalling or reinstalling,
the platform can often benefit from more memory.

I have a few customers that bought computers with 512MB memory and XP,
but the (since they didn't seek my advice) complained about the
computers being slow - as it turns out, they had a medical app and then
multiple spreadsheets, outlook, word, and a couple other apps open all
the time - using more than 512MB of memory. Moved them to 1GB and they
said it was like having a new computer...

I normally buy Win 7 systems with 3GB of memory for home users and
people that don't use a lot of apps at the same time, if they run Photo
editors or video editors I get 4-8GB of RAM as the base.

 

[Jo-Anne]

His ran faster because he was consuming more memory space than he had
for physical memory so he had to use more pagefile space (which is a
file on the hard disk which is obviously a lot slower to access than
system RAM). Whether or not your setup would speed up depends on
whether or not you are using more memory space than you have for
physical system RAM. Do you? What does Task Manager show under its
Performance tab?

If you aren't using up all the physical RAM that you already have then
adding more just means there will be more unused physical memory.
Unused physical memory is wasted memory and only considered as a reserve
should you start loading more concurrent processes. Load you typical
suite of programs that you load concurrently during you use of your host
and then see if you've exceeded the physical memory in your host. Some
programs will suck up as much memory as they can get (up to the 2GB user
memory space available to a normal application) but you never mention
what programs you run, like video editing which can use a lot of memory.

If you only have a single 1GB stick inside your host then it's possible
that adding another matching 1GB stick will speed up your host but the
speedup is more likely detectable by benchmarks than what you will see
in the actual use of your host. This is because dual-channel mode may
get engaged when you pair up the memory modules. That might give you
8-17% increase in a benchmark for memory but it's likely you won't
notice any change in the real-world use of your host. The problem is
that you may already have two 512MB sticks in your host and there are
only 2 slots, so going from 1GB to 2GB means you would have to discard
the old 512MB modules and insert two new 1GB modules. Instead of
increasing your memory, you would have to replace it which means you are
tossing the value of that old memory for which you don't know yet if you
have exceeded its capacity.

Thank you, Vanguard! What I have is one slot, holding 1GB right now. I'd
have to discard the 1GB and replace it with 2GB. The reason I was wondering
about more RAM is that my netbook seems a fair amount slower than my laptop
to boot up and to load programs, although it's configured pretty much the
same as the laptop.

Jo-Anne

 

[Jo-Anne]

The memory usage characteristics of the two OSes are quite different.

Based on the feedback people have given in the past, once WinXP has
512MB or so, any more than that is purely at your discretion in terms
of making room for the number of applications you normally have
simultaneously open. If you were doing emailing and web browsing and
using one application at a time, even 512MB might be good enough for
that. (I think the WinXP computer I set up back home was like that - I
put 512MB in it, and it was acceptable with a small number of open
applications like a web browser and email. It wouldn't be that
happy a situation running Photoshop.)

Windows 7 on the other hand, loves to use memory in preparation for
your next move. So it's doing work speculatively, on your behalf.
(English translation - the OS does whatever it feels like...)
And a larger physical memory install helps with that. My Windows 7
laptop has 3GB, and I'd hate to see how slow it would be with
less memory.

Having more memory is hardly ever a bad thing (Windows 98 excepted).

But whether you'd be "wowed" by the impact of the extra memory, probably
not.

Only certain situations, would provide a partial justification
for your purchase. As an example, I changed this machine (WinXP) from
2GB to 4GB, and I'd have a hard time proving to people it was
a good usage of money. The only time it helps, is when I'm running
three virtual machines at the same time, and even then, the WinXP
memory management begins to suck when any more than 2.6GB is in usage.
(To prove that, I did an experiment where I moved the pagefile onto
a RAMDisk, and WinXP sailed through the 2.6GB point like melted butter.
So it has something to do with paging or memory management of some
sort. You can actually run WinXP with more than 4GB, and use the
excess with a software RAMDisk, such as this one. I put my pagefile
on one of these software RAMDisks. When I was using this, I had 6GB
installed RAM on a 32 bit OS, and the RAMDisk was set up to provide
2GB storage. I have since returned to the 4GB configuration and
having a single pagefile on C:.)

http://memory.dataram.com/products-and-services/software/ramdisk

Paul

Thank you, Paul! Maybe I need to look elsewhere for why my netbook boots and
opens programs slower than my laptop (although I think the laptop has 2GB of
memory rather than the 1GB that the netbook has).

Jo-Anne

 

[Jo-Anne]

When XP first came out it would run well on 256MB RAM, then it was
512MB, but, as people and vendors have bloated their apps and continued
to run everything on their system without uninstalling or reinstalling,
the platform can often benefit from more memory.

I have a few customers that bought computers with 512MB memory and XP,
but the (since they didn't seek my advice) complained about the
computers being slow - as it turns out, they had a medical app and then
multiple spreadsheets, outlook, word, and a couple other apps open all
the time - using more than 512MB of memory. Moved them to 1GB and they
said it was like having a new computer...

I normally buy Win 7 systems with 3GB of memory for home users and
people that don't use a lot of apps at the same time, if they run Photo
editors or video editors I get 4-8GB of RAM as the base.



--
You can't trust your best friends, your five senses, only the little
voice inside you that most civilians don't even hear -- Listen to that.
Trust yourself.
(e-mail address removed) (remove 999 for proper email address)

Thank you, Leythos! My netbook has 1GB of memory, but I don't use it for
many things; I mainly surf the net, check email, and listen to radio
programs on it. It's great for when I travel even if it is slower than my
laptop (which I think has 2GB of memory).

Jo-Anne

 

[BillW50]

In

When XP first came out it would run well on 256MB RAM, then it was
512MB, but, as people and vendors have bloated their apps and
continued to run everything on their system without uninstalling or
reinstalling, the platform can often benefit from more memory.

I have a few customers that bought computers with 512MB memory and XP,
but the (since they didn't seek my advice) complained about the
computers being slow - as it turns out, they had a medical app and
then multiple spreadsheets, outlook, word, and a couple other apps
open all the time - using more than 512MB of memory. Moved them to
1GB and they said it was like having a new computer...

I normally buy Win 7 systems with 3GB of memory for home users and
people that don't use a lot of apps at the same time, if they run
Photo editors or video editors I get 4-8GB of RAM as the base.

I hear the same thing all of the time, but I don't see it. I go by the
Task Manager and other such tools to check the amount of physical RAM
that is in use. And I am quite surprised by Windows 7. As XP often wants
about 800MB of RAM on boot up. And this won't change much just checking
email and browsing a little. And I find the exact same memory amount
being used by Windows 7 with the same tasks.

What did surprise me was how much of the processor Windows 7 needs over
XP. As Windows 7 needs 300MHz of processor speed just for itself. On a
multi-core system, not a big deal. But on a single core system running
633MHz (under clocked for my testing), Windows 7 was eating 50% of the
processor just for itself at idle. And you guessed it, running
applications under these conditions are really slow. Even though this
test system had 2GB of RAM.