options with ram and windows vista
 

Hello again

As stated in the last thread I posted I just bought a Dell Vostros 1500 laptop and thanks to jmke's comment i found out that this particular laptop has 2 dimm slots.

I've also found out that 32bit windows OS only detects up to 3GB of ram, anymore then that and it won't be utilized or the OS will become unstable.

If i went 64bit, drivers wouldn't be a problem for me because I've already tracked down all the drivers I'd need.

Is there a real speed difference between 32bit and 64bit OS? I tried vista x64 when it was in beta but only for about 5 minutes seeming there were no drivers for it at the time and it kept crashing on me.

My main question is if i should just get a set of 2x 1GB ram stick and use em in dualchannel with 32 bit windows or buy a 2GB stick with the intent of getting another down the road and running Windows Vista 64 bit?

2GB stick is still expensive; I'd stay with 2 x 1 GB.

Depends on video card choice; Dell offers three different video options. For video card memory sharing, 4GB total ram the waste is about 512MB. I am pretty comfortable using 2GB with Vista 32-bit.

I have a Dell Dimension 6400 with 2Gb (2*1Gb) of ram and that's more than enough if you ask me :-p . I don't know what you intend to do with your laptop, for for everyday use, 1Gb is even enough.
Personaly, I wouldn't go for 64-bit yet, simply because of a lack of drivers and thus a lack of performance and functionality.

thanks guys been a big help, I'm pretty much going to be using the laptop for alot of graphics and photoshop stuff for college and then some gaming also, such as BF 2 and oblivion. I've decided to go with a dual channel 2x 1GB set of Geil ram from newegg, after rebates its only $63 so i figure i'll jump on that and just run 32 bit OS for now.

Figure i'll also try vista again but if it gives me to much BS then i'm goin back to xp pro.

-Ray

Wouldn't bother with Vista until SP1 is released (in 2009 :/)