Upgrading RAM 1330, how far to go?

Getting my 1330 this week (fingers crossed no problems) and was going to upgrade my RAM from 1gb to 2gb. Friend said that if I was going to upgrade, I might as well go to 4gb since 2gb wouldn't be that much. Price for the 4gb is reasonable too at 160, but I think 4gb is a little too much even looking towards the future (plan on keeping this computer for 3 years at least). I already know about windows inability to utilize the full 4gb anyways, but has anyone found 2gb not to be sufficient or getting a little to close for comfort?

 

4 GB is alot of RAM, and most people will do fine with 2 GB. Also, if your using a 32-bit Windows OS, then it will not be able to recognise and address all of that RAM. It will see around 3.2 to 3.5 GB. A good spot would be something like 3 GB, as all of that is recognised by Windows, and it covers yourself, if you do stray over 2 GB in general usage.

 

Thanks for the help. I want to keep it dual channel if possible. How much more RAM would you think the 64-bit OS would eat up?

 

well, as he said, 4GB is alot of RAM and is only needed for a user who is doing heavy gaming and multitasking. I would go with 2GB and if in the future you think you need more, then upgrade to 3,4GB. 4GB is unnessesery now. Hope I could help.

 

Dual channel should only be used if the memory frequency is lower than that of the FSB. For example, if you are using 667 MHz RAM with an FSB of 800 MHz, then you should match your memory modules and ude dual channel. This way, under processor and memory intensive applications, the processor is not bottlenecked by the RAM.

I'm not sure of how much RAM a 64-bit OS would use, but to use such an OS, would be difficult, because of the limited number of programs specifically for 64-bit. Also, its slighly pointless using a 64-bit OS, just to take advantage of that 500 MB of extra RAM.

 

Vista, now, needs 3.5 GB to run like XP does with 2 GB. How, BTW, are you getting 4 GB for $160 - the cheapest I've seen is about $190+s&h?

re: not seeing all the RAM - on a Santa Rosa with dedicated graphics, you should be able to use 3.5 GB out of that 4 GB, which is really not bad. On pre-Santa Rosa, you'll only get 3.25 GB, which is still good.

Yes, you can get away with 2 GB on Vista. But Vista will not be "snappy" unless you have 4 GB; I've tried both on modern dual-core machines with dedicated graphics. Even XP, BTW, runs noticeably better on 4 GB, though it's fine with 2 GB (and decent with 1 GB).

That's my 2 cents.