Running single channel memory on a dual channel board: Per..

External Since: Dec 05, 2006 Posts: 3

I originally posted this question to the laptop group but couldn't get
a satisfactory answer to my question so I'm posting it here because I've
found this group to be very knowledgeable and helpful.

I bought a Toshiba M115 Dual Core laptop, running at 533mhz, with 512
(two 256 meg bricks) of memory running in dual channel. It came with
with the Win XP Media Center OS. I'm thinking of upgrading the memory to
either 1 gig or maybe even two gigs --which is very expensive given that
I payed $750.00 for the laptop (bought it in the USA, brought it back to
Norway). Checking the Crucial site, two matched pairs of 512 meg bricks
costs $151.99, whereas two matched 1 gig bricks costs $278.00 My
question is: how much of a performance hit will I take if I decide to
buy a a 1 gig brick and replace that for one of the 256 bricks -and
maybe buy another 1 gig brick later, if I feel like I need it. I
understand that doing so means that I'll be running single channel...but
will I notice a performance hit? I'm not a gamer but I do have Photoshop
installed on it, and Photoshop will use all the memory it can get.
Off topic but kind of related, the laptop came with a ton of software
most of which I've deleted but the Task Manager shows that it's running
60 some processes, taking up around 300 megs of memory. Many of the
descriptions of the processes in the Task Manager are sort of cryptic,
meaning that I have to Google each process to see what it does, and I've
frankly been to lazy to do it at this point. Still, it would be nice to
free up 100 megs or so.

--PS

External Since: Dec 17, 2005 Posts: 308

P Settli wrote:
> I bought a Toshiba M115 Dual Core laptop, running at 533mhz, with 512
> (two 256 meg bricks) of memory running in dual channel. It came with
> with the Win XP Media Center OS. I'm thinking of upgrading the memory to
> either 1 gig or maybe even two gigs --which is very expensive given that
> I payed $750.00 for the laptop (bought it in the USA, brought it back to
> Norway). Checking the Crucial site, two matched pairs of 512 meg bricks
> costs $151.99, whereas two matched 1 gig bricks costs $278.00 My
> question is: how much of a performance hit will I take if I decide to
> buy a a 1 gig brick and replace that for one of the 256 bricks -and
> maybe buy another 1 gig brick later, if I feel like I need it. I
> understand that doing so means that I'll be running single channel...but
> will I notice a performance hit? I'm not a gamer but I do have Photoshop
> installed on it, and Photoshop will use all the memory it can get.

I doubt there's going to be much that's noticeable, except in
benchmarks. I don't know if you'll be able to mix and match the 256M &
the 1G modules together though, regardless of whether you want to settle
with single-channel.

> Off topic but kind of related, the laptop came with a ton of software
> most of which I've deleted but the Task Manager shows that it's running
> 60 some processes, taking up around 300 megs of memory. Many of the
> descriptions of the processes in the Task Manager are sort of cryptic,
> meaning that I have to Google each process to see what it does, and I've
> frankly been to lazy to do it at this point. Still, it would be nice to
> free up 100 megs or so.

That's a typical XP install these days.

If you're really into optimization then you can try Black Viper's
Windows XP Tweak site. It's no longer being updated, but it's been
mirrored statically.

Black Viper's Windows Xp Services Configuration - BestTechie Forums
http://www.besttechie.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=3007

Yousuf Khan