Upgrading RAM: matching sticks questions

I've just ordered a new Latitude D630 through my university. The model I got comes with a single 1GB stick of memory. I definitely want to upgrade to 2GB but I'm wondering what the best way to do it is. I've been doing a bunch of reading, but I'm a bit confused by all the options.

My choices:
- Buy another matching Dell stick for about $100
- Pick up a single non-matching stick for about $40 from neweg
- Get 2 matching 1Gb sticks for $80-90
- Get a single non-matching 2GB stick for $135

I can afford any of these options (but can't spring for the second 2GB stick now), but I want to make sure I'm making the best value vs performance choice.

Basically, I'm wondering a few things:
1. How important is it to have matching sticks?
2. If matching sticks is important, are there any real benefits to the Dell stick over the third party ones since the total cost of getting 2GB of Dell memory will be about the same as buying 2GB of matching memory?
3. With the dual-channel memory, will I get significantly better performance from 3GB of non-matching memory than 2GB of matching memory?
4. If I upgraded to 4GB later, will my Santa Rosa chipset running 32-bit Vista Business be able to use all 4GB? If not, how much usable memory would I get?
5. If not and my system is set up as dual-boot and I installed 64-bit Ubuntu, would I still get the benefit of the 4GB while running Linux?

 

Matching sticks don't really have a large effect, if anything the only possible downfall is the compatiability issue between the two sticks, which is a rarity.

Picking up a single 2gb stick is a good option, since Vista32 only recognizes 3.2gb. I'm not too keen on Ubuntu though.

 

You'll need to get Vista64 if you plan on using any more than 3.2gb ram in windows. :/

 

Thanks for the advice.

Is there any particular reason you don't like Ubuntu? I'm pretty new to Linux and had decided I'd go with Ubuntu since it seemed like the learning curve might be a little less steep with Ubuntu than some of the other options. I haven't made a final decision though, so I'm interested in opinions.

Thanks!

 

I never said that, I was just saying I'm not too familiar with it.

 

Ubuntu is actually great if you can use it. Virtually no viruses, nearly 100% secure, etc. It's quite an amazing OS if you can live without Windows.

 

I saw a really cool vid of Ubuntu that had me interested. I suppose it could easily be used for a word processor, internet browsing, multimedia machine. But for games, you are mostly SOL as far as I know.

I guess thats what dual boot is for

 

Some games are compatible with Wine (windows emulator run within Linux). Pretty sure CS:S is 100% compatible.