Re: How much memory?

orc wrote:
I have a pc with an XP PC with 1GB of memory and occasionally run
processor hungry video editing software.

Is there any easy way to tell if increasing the physical memory
would improve the performance? I.e looking at how much paged memory
is used while processing a large file?

Shenan Stanley wrote:
Well - the easiest solution - buy more memory.
http://www.crucial.com/
(Use the advisor.)

Knowing that in general - while you can have unused memory - the
$35-$100(U.S.) will help ensure you don't have too little.

Other than that - figure out (without running the video editor
right now) what applications in Process Explorer or something
similar are using the most memory and see which ones you can do
without and find a way of shutting them down before you start
processing video.
As far as a more scientific method, I will quote Ron Martell:

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.

M.H. quoted from the posting by Shenan only this:
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.
<which is an insufficient quotation IMHO>
<see above for the entire quote>

M.H. wrote:
I disagree. Due to hardware memory mapping, 32-bit Windows XP will
not be able to utilize a full 4GB physical memory space. Real world
accessible memory would be about 3-3.4GB of memory, with 4GB of
physical memory installed. I'd recommend not installing more than
3GB of memory in a 32-bit NT-based Windows system.


Windows XP 32-bit - dependent on the hardware/software configuration - can
see/utilize from 3.1GB to 3.65GB of the 4GB of memory and Windows XP 64-bit
can utilize/see more than 4GB easily. 3.1GB does seem to be the more common
amount seen in Windows XP. Not that this had anything to do with the OPs
question...

Also, as you can see from the complete quotation of the post, I merely
quoted "Ron Martell" for the part you quoted. You should have at least left
that part in in your snippet - as I was quoting someone else and gave the
appropriate credit.

As for your statement, "I'd recommend not installing more than 3GB of memory
in a 32-bit NT-based Windows system."... Someone could also install
3.1-3.5GB of memory and have a possibility of seeing/utilizing all of it
even in a 32-bit OS (such as Windows XP.) It may not be a common thing to
have strange amounts of memory like that - but is entirely plausible. ;-)

The fact is - many people (business-app users, those who utilize their
computer for checking email, typing 'letters' and the likes, even casual
game players) will not gain much by going over 1GB of memory with Windows XP
32-bit. Only when they start processing video, large data sets and other
memory intensive applications/uses will most see a benefit. ;-)

--
Shenan Stanley
MS-MVP
--
How To Ask Questions The Smart Way
http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html


.

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