dmd3x Posted January 20, 2003 Share Posted January 20, 2003 I am comparing two OS (WinXP Pro and RedHat 8) for a project in computer class. How much memory does Windows XP Pro use when you boot it up and have IE and AIM open? I use RedHat 8, and it uses 170MB after I boot up and have Mozilla and Gaim open (0 bytes of swap is used). I have 256MB of RAM, and 768MB swap space available (I don't think I really need that much but oh well). Thanks for your help. Any suggestions and other comparisons (non-biased) you may have are welcome. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kuregu02 Posted January 20, 2003 Share Posted January 20, 2003 Windows XP will run fine with that amount of ram (My mom's computer has 128MB of RAM and is I think a 300MHz processor and it runs fine, so you should have nothing to worry about) ;) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dmd3x Posted January 20, 2003 Author Share Posted January 20, 2003 Do you have any numbers (in MB) of how much RAM it uses under the circumstance that I mentioned? Thanks for the information anyway. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
[xan] Posted January 20, 2003 Share Posted January 20, 2003 <100 MB (without AIM - i don't use) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kuregu02 Posted January 20, 2003 Share Posted January 20, 2003 Do you have any numbers (in MB) of how much RAM it uses under the circumstance that I mentioned? Thanks for the information anyway. With IE loaded there is 25MB of physical RAM left and there is 95MB in the page file. This is without an IM client loaded (there is not one installed at all). Hope this helps! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dmd3x Posted January 20, 2003 Author Share Posted January 20, 2003 With IE loaded there is 25MB of physical RAM left and there is 95MB in the page file. This is without an IM client loaded (there is not one installed at all). Hope this helps! Thank you, that is very usefull. Does anyone know why Windows doesnt use the 25MB of physical RAM that is left and the swap file is 95MB? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
xWeston Posted January 20, 2003 Share Posted January 20, 2003 Wow, that is a pretty definitive comparison. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kuregu02 Posted January 20, 2003 Share Posted January 20, 2003 Does anyone know why Windows doesnt use the 25MB of physical RAM that is left and the swap file is 95MB? I think it's because if Windows needs some part of the OS in the RAM urgently it will have the ability to do that without bogging down the system while it swaps the data in RAM into the swap file. I'm not sure if this is the case but that's my guess. :unsure: Plus there is not enough RAM ;) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
morganpugh84 Posted January 20, 2003 Share Posted January 20, 2003 My system is using 152MB of RAM after being booted for 2 hours. It is running Windows Messenger, 4 IE windows (all in the same process), The Bat! 1.62, PopUp Ad Filter and Norton AntiVirus 2003, as well as a few background programs such as IntelliType and IntelliPoint, etc. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rudy Posted January 20, 2003 Share Posted January 20, 2003 you cant compare the 2 OS unless u try them on the SAME hardware, or else you will always get different results Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zombie9920 Posted January 20, 2003 Share Posted January 20, 2003 XP with IE loaded uses about 100MB of RAM on my system(it has 256MB of RAM). I dunno how much more AIM would add to the RAM usage(probably only like 1 or 2 more MB). I have a firewall loaded into the systray and I have the Audigy control center loaded in the systray also so the 100MB of RAM usage on my system is probably a little higher than what it would be if I had those 2 things unloaded. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
helmers Posted January 20, 2003 Share Posted January 20, 2003 Jesus, you can't compare the two systems. First of, Linux uses a lot more RAM, but the RAM is counted per instance in each application, meaning that shared libs get counted many times extra(this depends on how you measure it; a "free -h" would be in the clear, I guess). Then, there is the cache that get counted as "used" memory in linux. WindowsXP doesn't do this. And if you have a decent amount of memory in linux you don't need a swap partition. At the very least don't mount it at boot time, there is no need to encourage Linux to swap. Also, if you compile programs with the "-Os" optimization, they get optimized for size/memory usage. This can be done with LFS-type distros, such as Gentoo. I've been able to load KDE+Konqueror on my P3-laptop, using only 48MB of its 128MB (including whatever cached). That's very small. With 256 MB RAM, you don't NEED a swap file. I've compiled Mozilla&Xfree on my laptop mentioned below, and I didn't need a swap partition. You don't need it either, unless RedHat have made some crap. Also not that the "swap" counted in WindowsXP isn't actually swap, it is VIRTUAL MEMORY, meaning a combination of swap & RAM. In most cases it never touches the disk. Conclusion: This is a hopeless comparison. It is too hard to do it, and do it fairly. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KC Posted January 20, 2003 Share Posted January 20, 2003 It really matters man, XP will use as much as it can. if you have 128 it will only use a little if you have 256 it will use a little more. I boot with nothing loaded and have 256 and it use's around 100megs Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JoGro123 Posted January 20, 2003 Share Posted January 20, 2003 The problem with this comparison is both systems have advanced memory management as well as virtual memory. I know that at least in WindowsXP the system will partition and use memory as needed depending on the amount available. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dmd3x Posted January 21, 2003 Author Share Posted January 21, 2003 I guess you really can't compare the two. Like apples and oranges. They work differently, plus I don't even have a way of testing both OS on the same hardware. I guess it's time to compare in other ways. Thanks for your help everyone! :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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