Computer Requirements

[inabottle]

Thanks, I will start saving up my allowance, thanks for the tidbits, and they will be put to good use you can be assured. http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif and yes, I am proud to be apart of the XARA WORLD!

[RAMWolff44]

I agree with Soquili and Grant. I would get as much RAM on board as you can and then follow Soquili's advice and set your paging file as instructed, it really does make a differance. I know, I did it a while back and it makes a difference on my super duper machine that I built myself!!

BTW, Kingston rules in the RAM dept. It's all I use. If I can't get it at Fry's then I go to a wonderful on line resource called Newegg.com: Newegg.com - Kingston memory page and be patient, the page is infomation intensive, so it will take a couple of minutes to load up!! Also, stay away from anything that says DDR, more than likely you have a machine that only takes SDRAM memory sticks!!

My next suggestion would be to look into building your own computer from scratch. It's about 1/2 the cost of one of those computers from Dell or Gateway and we're talkin about the top of the line guts to put in, not the cheap crap that most of the pre made comuputers come with. I ran 2 Gateways and a Compaq and then built my own and let me tell ya, what HUGE difference!! http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif

Good luck and have fun!! http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/smile.gif

Richard http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

---Wolff On The Prowl---

http://www.ramwolffsworld.com/

[colin_e]

There's quite a bit of comment on the 'Net to the effect that Windows 98 and earlier releases handle memory so badly that performance may actually go DOWN with more than 256MB of RAM.

This may be dependent on the app you are running, (and Xara X may be one of the good ones), but it's worth bearing in mind.

BTW, if it's any consolation, I installed XX on my new "graphics+games" machine, an Athlon 2200+XP with 1GB of RAM and 2x80GB disks (striped). Heavy use of brushes will bring even this machine to it's knees, so Xara is very fair when it comes to hardware ;-)

Mind you, this machine runs XP, I have just read an article claiming XP has a known memory-management bug that will degrade performance for "applications using large amounts of memeory intensively", so maybe XP has it's own issues in this area.

[jon spain]

Soquili

Your comments are most helpful (and thanx for the cream comment above). Were you suggesting Win2kPro or is the Home edition as good? It may no longer be available but that's something else.

Recently, I've had so much trouble with 98SE, which reinstalls failed to cure, that I felt I had to upgrade. Before I took the plunge, I cleared out the registry of stuff I didn't know was still there which seems to have helped enormously. I used "jv16 power tools" which is donorware from www.jv16.org.
Jon

[Soquili]

Hi Jon,

I don't recall a Win2K home edition, although I do recall that some people called WinME the Win2K home edition when it first came out. WinME is actually more like Win98 third edition.

Cleaning out the Registry can help tremendously. I use a combination of the RegClean utility from Microsoft and Norton's registry cleaner. I'll try the program you mentioned. Microsoft should have their Add/Remove software do a better job of cleaning the registry when software is uninstalled.

Soquili

[jon spain]

Soquili

According to M$ (see below), I would need 2Gb hard space spare to run Win2kPro. Is that right?

http://www.microsoft.com/windows2000...qs/default.asp

Jon

[Soquili]

Hi Jon,

You would need at least 640MB free space on a 2GB hard drive to install Win2K Pro. I'm not positive as to why they specify a 2GB hard drive; I assume it's because IDE drives manufactured before the 2GB were much slower in their read and write ability. I've never installed Win2K Pro on any drive smaller than 4GB.

Soquili

[jon spain]

Soquili

Thanx, I'm talking about spare space, though, which is what I thought M$ had in mind! As I have 1.1Gb spare on the C: drive, but 2Gb nowhere, that's why I was worried. Probbably my best plan is to replace the C: drive with something much larger and then mirror what I have on to a folder on the new C:. Actually, clearing over 80 registry items really does seem to have helped and I found that my IT colleagues use "jv16". Thanx

Jon

[dalel]

Go to Control Panel/System/Performance/Virtual Memory and choose "Select my own virtual memory" and set it to zero. That's right, to ZERO!

Restart your computer.

Use the Windows defrag utility and defrag your hard drive and any partitions completely.

Go back into Control Panel/System/Performance/Virtual Memory and reset it to the desired size, 1.5 to 2.5 the size of your memory.

This will push the Swap file to the end of your hard drive instead of the start of it. I swear it makes the hard drive operate more efficiently in relation to using the swap file. Defragging also helps to make searching the hard drive faster.

I agree that boosting the RAM is the best thing you can do to upgrade on a budget. RAM is dirt cheap now and you will notice a big difference with very little money invested.

http://talkgraphics.infopop.net/1/Op...&ul=1101906325
Why, I’m afraid I can’t explain myself, sir, because I’m not myself, you know...
- Lewis Carroll

[colin_e]

Also, If you set the maxiumum and minumum size of the paging file to the same value (e.g. max and
min both 512MB, or max and min both 1GB) this will avoid Windows fragmenting the page file as it expands+contracts.

Regards: Vole