[32] Vista Memory

I've bought computers using Win 95, 98 and XP, each equipped with the minimum memory suggested by Microsoft. I added memory to each with little apparent difference in performance.

I recently bought a computer with Vista Home Basic and 512MB of memory. The performance sucked. Turned off the fancy graphics, background processes, etc, without benefit. Upgraded to 2GB and the difference is amazing. What most surprised me is that system startup and shutdown are each about 10 times faster. (No exaggeration, shutdown used to take minutes, it now takes seconds).

I don't have a question unless someone cares to comment on the difference between Vista and the older versions. Is Microsoft understating the minimum needed for Vista? After all, Bill Gates once said no one needs more than 640K of memory.

Windows Vista recommended system requirements

Home Basic
512 MB of system memory

Home Premium / Business / Ultimate
1 GB of system memory

And then we, the users, multiply times 2 or 3...

MS have always tended to understate the minimum requirements IMO, but it is definitely a lot more apparent with Vista than with earlier versions. I'm running Vista X64 with 4GB or RAM on my main rig, and Vista will take half of that before I've even opened up a single app.

Pull up the resource monitor , I just did and boy did I get a shock!

Hard faults until the laptop was up for about 5 - 7 minutes.

Quote:

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Bill Gates once said no one needs more than 640K of memory

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It's still allocated in Vista....hehehe

I've always advocated that with Microsoft (or anybody else for that matter) users ought to completely ignore the Minimum System Requirements. I've almost always found them to be a complete joke and will get you in nothing but trouble if the purchase is based on them. I've also told people they should take the Recommended Systems Requirements and think of those as the "Minimum".