Windows 2000 RAM recomendations?

[Unclemo]

Ok, first I knew this has probably been answered before and is known by most...

I have WIN98 and NT4 running oon my LAN. Lowest machine is running on P200mhz with 64 RAM... the rest have at least 96 RAM and above 233mhz. How much slower will WINdows 2000 be on the less powerful machines? I also heard from somewhere that PCs with more than 64 megs of ram actually run faster on Win2000 than win98. Is this true? Please inform me.
THanks

 

[Needles]

Go 256MB. Win2k rocks with it. I had 128MB and the performance, especially in games, was horrendous. Now it's a pleasure to use my computer again.

 

[dandan]

second nod for 256mb. 128 works fine most of the time till you get into large photo or 3d work.
running this on a p233 is not fun. i tried this for about a week till i put it back to 98se.

 

[Celstar]

Yep 256 will handle even the most intensive 3d games.

 

[Psychoholic]

From a performance standpoint 256MB should be a minimum.

 

[Blayze]

I have run/still am Windows 2000 on one of my machines thats only a Pentium Pro 200 w/ 256k of cache and 64 megs of edo ram. its a little slow, but boots up fast and works great as a internet only box

 

[Davegod75]

for performance get 256mb it's your best bet

 

[gtb55447work]

not to be redundant but 256 is the best!

 

[Mem]

If you cannot afford 256mb(which as everyone says is best) go with 192mb at least.

 

[Zaphs]

This depends on what version of Windows 2000 you'll be using.
I use Windows 2000 Professional and I am happily using 128MB. My games are lightning fast (80-90fps quake3 1024x768 high detail)

When I was using Windows 2000 advanced server with this same configuration I definately noticed a slow down.

So I guess my recomendation would be as follows:

Windows 2000 Professional - 128MB
Windows 2000 Server/Advanced Server - 256+ MB

 

[CQuinn]

Tweak3d guides for

Windows 2k

Windows 2k Memory/HD

 

[Ausm]

I would definately go with 256 Mb myself

 

[GT1999]

There is absolutely no limit for an NT-based OS.

Seriously, I'd shoot for anywhere between 256-512MB, depending on what you'll be doing on the machine, and how many applications you like to have running at once. I'd rather have a second processor than go beyond 256MB, but Photoshop gurus will die if they have less than 512.

 

[Braxus]

I would at least get 160MB (128+32)at the very least due to the fact that for most users The OS itself takes around 100 MB. 60MB to play with should be good for most people. My system eats about 145MB on W2K pro when I'm playing Q3A. Remember the good ol days of Win3.x? You could run that DOS6 + Win3.1 fairly well with only 4MB of RAM.

 

[Psychoholic]

Braxus where exactly do you derive that the OS uses 100MB from. Maybe if you have a ton of stuff loading at startup, but that wouldn't be the OS that's your software. Even then that's a really high figure.

 

[Gatsby]

256 is the only way to go man.

Diablo 2 is the only program I have seen on win2lk to take more than 128 buts its nice when you can have too many windos open and not notice a speed decrease

Gatsby

 

[Psychoholic]

<< I'd rather have a second processor than go beyond 256MB >>



Good thing I didn't have to choose!!! Hardware upgrades are easy when your company takes care of your computers for you!!

 

[LANMAN]

<......&quot;Maybe if you have a ton of stuff loading at startup, but that wouldn't be the OS.....&quot;>

I don't know about the rest of you, but 100Meg seems alot smaller then most of the installations I have been doing.. so to me the 100Meg would be atleast the OS... I can't believe it isn't more... your sure not running a whole lot of the OS if thats all of what you need installed.
(Windows 98 takes at least 50-90 meg.. sure your figures are right? Its possible he might be talking about his swap file...)

Hardware upgrades are easy when I take care of them for you..

--LANMAN

 

[Psychoholic]

I would assume we're talking about actual physical memory being used when first started. Reboot then look and see what the actual total commited memory is. After you have run some software that figure does change quite a bit. Of course services being run will vary it somewhat but from what I have seen 100MB is still high.

 

[urbantechie]

Running Win2k Adv server here with 256mb RAM with unnecessary services disabled and runs smooth as silk. I've ran win2k on a celeron 333 with 64mb ram and ran fine.

 

[MI6]

I am running 128 pc133 with win2k pro, when i look at my mem i am rarely over 93k, even while running netscape, winamp, and some mis start up programs. Of cource i agree with almost everyone one else that if you can get 256, go 256.

 

[Moonark]

Win 2K actually only requires 32 MB but is is slower than anything you can think of, 128 is better, but overall it will rock with 256 or higher

 

[Unclemo]

I don't like the thought of having to put 256 ram in all my machines.. could get very expensive. I think until I get a whole new generation of PCs around here I will stick to win 98 and NT4. While we are on the subject.. How do you all like the performance of win2000 when compared to NT4 with the same amount of RAM in each system?

 

[Psychoholic]

NT4 is slightly faster than W2K overall but the difference is slight. I would much rather run W2K than NT4 due to the benefits you gain. Better user level security options and better (read easier) hardware support are just a few of the things that puts W2K ahead of NT4.