I hear that windows 98 has problems dealing with >512Mb of ram. I also know that supposedly, all that needs to be done is to change a few settings in some file....

Anyone want to clue me in? I have a friend who just bought 512Mb of ram, and needs to know (why he doesn't use 2k, I dunno).

Hi Paul,

I am running 512mb on 98 and 2k. I havent noticed any problems, nor noticeable improvements since upgrading from 256mb

hmm I heard about this, mainly that Win98 doesn't usilitize anything over 512 MB of RAM. I'm not sure if this is true though. There might be something in the registry that you have to do but your guess is as good as mine.

As for performance differences with having more RAM. You don't see much difference unless you really use MANY applications at once or use some real mem hogs. I find the difference between 128 and 256 a lot more noticeable than 256 and 512. Probably because I don't use as many programs that make me go over 256 MB, but when I push the system, I can get a lot faster response time with 512 MB compared to 256.

so if you don't see much improvement when increasing from 128 MB to 256 let's say, then you're probably not using up enough memory that it'll be noticeable.

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Yeah with the 512 my friend dont notic a differnce ither. But I have read that it actully slows it down. Sice it cant ulitize in the 512.

I dealt with this in another forum.
Win98 don't properly use 512 meg of ram and will in some
cases (most) slow the computer down.
256 is not always enough ram and adding another 128 meg will
make it optimal.

Also make sure that each ram chip is matching in size, i.e.
128 + 128 + 128, it's a bandwidth thing.

Win2K benefits big from 512, but not win98.

I can retrive exserts if you want from that other forum about
this problem.

Just let me know.

P.S. No reg workarounds either.

__________________
Serious Soldier

I know that by default it doesn't make effective use of 512Mb, but I have read (in forums) that there are .ini settings to change, etc, so that it does make (more) effective use of the ram.

He's got a P3 866 (this friend of mine), and just got 512Mb of ram, because he tends to do LOTS of heavy flash animations, just bought TrueSpace, and has a zillion other things open. Should I tell him simply to switch to 2k, for performance benefits, stability, and better ability to use 512Mb?

__________________
paul@pleaseohpleasedontspamme.slcentral.com
A mathematician is a device for turning coffee into theorems -- P. Erdos

That would be a good idea to switch to win2k, but you'll still
have to tweak win2k to max the performance.
I'm sure you know that.
The tweaks you are talking about in win98 don't gain you much
in performance and can be dangerous to your system.
The gain comes out to less than 2%.
If it he switches to win2k, make sure all his software will
support win2k.

This is a "feature" of Windows. According to Q253912 in Microsoft's knowledge base this can be resolved by limiting the memory used by Windows by:

Type Start/Run msconfig

From the General tab, click on "Advanced"

Place a check mark in "Limit Memory To" and fill in 512MB to limit the amount of memory used by Windows

Click on OK. You will be told to reboot

or by limiting the amount of memory that Vcache uses to 512 megabytes (524,288 KB) or less by using the MaxFileCache setting in the System.ini file to reduce the maximum amount.

If you have over 1GB of memory you may need to limit the amount of memory used by Windows by modifying the MaxPhysPage paramater in Windows as describe in Microsoft KnowledgeBase article Q181862.

Quick question then,

So what do you do with win2k to get better utilization of RAM? I have a P3 with 933 with 768 megs of ram. All I have done currently is make my virtual memory as tiny as possible, but I am not sure that is correct. Thanx in advance for the help.

-BobNFloyd