Windows Vista x64 and 2GB of RAM

By petersaints
in Microsoft (Windows)

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petersaints

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Well lt's get straight to the point... I have the following system:

- Processor: AMD Athlon 64 3800+ Venice (2.4 GHz SINGLE CORE) @ 2.64 GHz

- Memory: Twinmos 4x512MB DDR-400MHz CAS 2.5 @ 440MHz

- Graphics Card: XFX Geforce 6600GT 256MB DDR3

- Hard Drive: Seagate 200GB SATA 7200RPM 8MB Cache

- Soundcard: Realtek ALC850 Onboard

- PSU: Eurotech 460W Silent

As you can see I have 2GB of RAM. I'm wondering is there any disavantage of installing Vista x64 with 2GB of RAM. I mean... the amount of extra memory required by the x64 version would mean that I would have less performance on x64 version than on x86?

I have been switching back and foward between XP and Vista on this machine (but I currently run Vista Home Premium x86 on my laptop for about a year) and settled with XP once SP3 came out. Now I thinking of going back to Vista and I want to know if there's any reason not to choose the 64-bit version with the system above? What should I do?

P.S.: I have all the drivers and all the software I need is either 64-bit compatible or is 64-bit native...

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afusion

Posted
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the other dude on Quillz's thread said x64 uses 2GB of RAM as a pagefile alone and that 4GB is minimum.

for your current machine install Vista32 w/ SP1 and you should enjoy your machine quite reasonably.

If you're "dying" to go 64bit start with a fresh new build w/ 4GB of RAM; my suggestion.

Enthusiast

tonyjr

Posted
Posted

If you have access to it, try Windows Server 2008 64-bit, and use the 'server 2008 as a workstation' guide, which you can find on google. I have found that it's really responsive, and is easy to setup to be just like your normal desktop would be. it is a lot quicker than x64 xp and vista x64. all the major 64bit drivers work fine with it with my experience so far (Y). good luck :-)

Grand Master

theyarecomingforyou

Posted
Posted

To be perfectly honest I wouldn't bother with Vista on a single-core machine, as my experience wasn't that great (AMD64 3200+ overclocked). However, if you have a dual-core processor and only 2GB of RAM then I would recommend Vista64, as that would give you the opportunity to upgrade to 4GB later without having to worry about it.

Grand Master

Ci7

Posted
Posted
If you have access to it, try Windows Server 2008 64-bit, and use the 'server 2008 as a workstation' guide, which you can find on google. I have found that it's really responsive, and is easy to setup to be just like your normal desktop would be. it is a lot quicker than x64 xp and vista x64. all the major 64bit drivers work fine with it with my experience so far (Y). good luck :-)

here we go again :rolleyes:

Grand Master

NEVER85

Posted
Posted
If you have access to it, try Windows Server 2008 64-bit, and use the 'server 2008 as a workstation' guide, which you can find on google. I have found that it's really responsive, and is easy to setup to be just like your normal desktop would be. it is a lot quicker than x64 xp and vista x64. all the major 64bit drivers work fine with it with my experience so far (Y). good luck :-)

Lol@this. Vista SP1 and Windows Server 2008 are identical.

Rising Star

nautiqueskier

Posted
Posted

k Just to set the record straight

the other dude on Quillz's thread said x64 uses 2GB of RAM as a pagefile alone and that 4GB is minimum.

The page file is a software controlled and there is no 2GB minimum (I have mine set to 512MB fixed on my x64 Vista machine). And no there isn't a 4GB minimum.

I don't see the point as most programs are currently 32-bit

Fair enough although certain programs are x64 enhanced and there are x64 apps on the horizon.

To answer your question, you can go to the x64 version of Windows, you won't likely notice any performance hit, but vice versa with 2GB of ram you are unlikely to see any real world benefits. In your situation I'd probably go with x64 but I also like living on the bleeding edge. If you have any doubt as to hardware compatibility and/or you run older applications then stick with the 32-bit version of Windows.

If you have access to it, try Windows Server 2008 64-bit, and use the 'server 2008 as a workstation' guide

Sigh... every time this one comes up. Firstly, Server 2008 is an expensive operating system and I don't know of anyone that legally has it sitting around for workstation use. Second, Server 2008 is faster because a lot of features that make up a consumer OS have been left out. Add those back in (and I mean all of them) and its speed will be roughtly comparable to Vista SP1. Third, your life will be riddled with incompatibilities if you get Server 2008 and some applications will outright refuse to run. I could go on.

Don't get me wrong, Server 2008 is a great OS. I use it on my servers. But it should be used in the environment it was designed for.

Do you think that with the machine stated above is better to have it running Vista SP1 32-bit rather than XP SP3?

Go with Vista. XP was made over 7 years ago and while its a great OS, the world has moved on. I know theres a ton of bad press about Vista but most of that is just momentum from its launch, which Microsoft handled lets just say poorly.

Grand Master

Raa

Posted
Posted

Do you have anything that needs Vista, or more rather, doesn't run on XP? If you've been happy with it, stay with it.

The hardware's probably "on the edge" for great performance (you'd see better performance from 4gb of ram - and it's cheap)

No real benefit from having x64 with that hardware, you'd do better to use it if you had 4+gb of ram though.

Choice is of course, up to you :)

Proficient

McDave

Posted
Posted

Fr@nky my hardware is pritty much the same but have the Athlon 4000 (near enough the same processor) and the 7600GT (again very close) + some cheap ram @2 gig. I personally run Vista64 and have few problems, my brother useing the same hardware has Vista32. Personally I don't see you noticing the diffrance.

The only disadvantage is that there are less drivers around for Vista64. You could do a quick search to see if the drivers are avalible. Really it should not be a problem these days. Looking at advantages Vista64 will support ram 4gig (Vista32 is only 3.somthing). Some people say its more secure but its really neither here or there.

Veteran

kernatch

Posted
Posted

I have similar (slightly less) as you: AMD 64 3500+, 4x512mb DDR400, ATI x800XL 256mb, same hard drive. I run Vista 64bit and have no complaints, although I should add that I haven't been doing much that's CPU or memory intensive. I'm interested to learn 64bit has higher requirements than 32bit?

@Raa - DDR isn't so cheap!

Apprentice

petersaints

Posted
  • Author
Posted

Basically, considering that there's no compatibility problems I just want to know if there's no performance hit on using Vista x64 over the x86 counterpart with only 2GB of RAM. I know that THE BIGGEST advantage of 64-bit computing is the ability to address more memory however if I have a 64-bit processor I'd like to use it at full capacity. I'll not choose 64-bit Vista only if I get a slower system than with 32-bit Vista. As far as I know the only reason to have less performance on 64-bit than on 32-bit, on a system with 2GB of RAM, is the increase of memory usage. I mean... how much the increase is? Is it negligible? Or can it slow things on certain circumstances?

Summing up all... What I want to know is that if there's any disadvantage, from a performance point, to go 64-bit with my system?

Grand Master

Eric Veteran

Posted
  • Veteran
Posted
Basically, considering that there's no compatibility problems I just want to know if there's no performance hit on using Vista x64 over the x86 counterpart with only 2GB of RAM. I know that THE BIGGEST advantage of 64-bit computing is the ability to address more memory however if I have a 64-bit processor I'd like to use it at full capacity. I'll not choose 64-bit Vista only if I get a slower system than with 32-bit Vista. As far as I know the only reason to have less performance on 64-bit than on 32-bit, on a system with 2GB of RAM, is the increase of memory usage. I mean... how much the increase is? Is it negligible? Or can it slow things on certain circumstances?

Summing up all... What I want to know is that if there's any disadvantage, from a performance point, to go 64-bit with my system?

I have a crappy Intel webcam and a Palm device that don't work on x64 and that's pretty much it. Plus you will have the added benefit of not having to reinstall the OS when you upgrade your RAM. :) You can get another 2G of RAM for like $50...

Grand Master

HawkMan

Posted
Posted

Vista x64 works perfectly with 2 gigs of ram, I shoudl know I've run it on a few computers with that config.

Vista x64 runs at least as good as 32 bit on 2 gigs, but you get the adantage of havign 64bit and being 64 bit ready. instead of asking do you need 64 bit, you need to ask is there any reason NOT to get 64 bit. and the answer is no. PErformance is the same or better, you can run 64 bit apps with any advantages some of them offers, you can upgrade your ram to as much as you want. With Vista there's no lack of 64 bit drivers anymore, if there's a vista drivers, there's a 64 bit vista driver.

Get Vista x64, you won't regret it. and you don't have to do a reinstall when you realize you need/want 64.

Apprentice

petersaints

Posted
  • Author
Posted

Ok... So now I know that the route is clean. I'll just keep XP SP3 for a now (I'm not in a mood of a complete format now) and well you know my PC is great for XP but just good enough for Vista and I'll lose a bit of the responsiveness I'm used to ;)

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