Reader Comments

well after it has taken this long those requirements are no longer even high. even less next year.

I'm genuinely curious, what about Windows Vista requires 512MB of RAM to run? I hate to bring Apple into this, but OS X runs on 256MB of RAM with all its graphic effects enabled, and XP runs on 256MB as well if you don't try to run multiple large apps simultaneously.

Sorry, bonch, but 512MB of RAM was woefully inadequate on my XP box (Pentium 4 processor). I upgraded it to 2MB, and THEN could I run multiple apps--even then it's objectively (not SUBjectively) less capable of doing so than my PowerBook. Still, it does an adequate job. But 256? My God. Forget about it. 512 was painful enough.

"I hate to bring Apple into this..." Who are you kidding? You guys can't stop comparing Windows with OS X. So, lotsa..., you say that an XP PC with 2 GB memory is not as good as a PowerBook with 256MB memory?If that was the case, so many people wouldn't be using XP today.

"Sorry, bonch, but 512MB of RAM was woefully inadequate on my XP box (Pentium 4 processor). I upgraded it to 2GB [sic], and THEN could I run multiple apps--even then it's objectively (not SUBjectively) less capable of doing so than my PowerBook. Still, it does an adequate job." Um, I've had machines with 512MB and with 1GB and have been able to run multiple large applications simultaneously with good performance on machines with old Athlon XPs. Saying it requires 2GB of memory to work efficiently sounds a lot like your trying to spread FUD which might be a little easier if XP hadn't been around for 4 years already.

I have to agree with Adrian, XP doesn't require particularly large amounts of RAM to run. In fact I found it usable on a machine with 64MB, though I wouldn't have recommended anyone else try it with so little memory.

Bonch's point is one of system requirements set by the company's who designed the systems, not our personal experiences with them. So before we all start talking about "my system" and "my experience with it" keep in mind that the comment was more so a fact rather than oppinion. The system requirements for OS X set by Apple for OS X 10.4 Tiger is 256MB ram: http://www.apple.com/macosx/techspecs/ Windows Vista requires twice that as Paul just stated in the article with the links he provided. What's implied is that OS X can enable high end graphics engine capabilities that in many analysts oppinions out-do Vista's engine on only 256MB of memory. That being Quartz Extreme, Core Image which creates the water ripple effects and niceties(sp) on OS X requires a high end graphics card for the needed boost. I wouldn't say the requirements sound high though, nor have I experienced- since we've been bringing up our personal experiences- what Vista can and can't do on those 512MB of ram. 256MB of Ram was all I had on my AMD Athlon XP 1700+ machine running XP Home and it ran just fine for average software that didn't require lots of ram. Obviously, if you need pro software you might want to upgrade beyond the minimal system requirements for any OS though. shark47: "You guys can't stop comparing Windows with OS X." Nor can you resist making comparisons on every topic yourself. Proof is in your own comments. Maybe it wouldn't get brought up so much if this wasn't a Windows blog, you know how it goes. Many users using many operating systems are users here, it's nothing new, nor are comparisons between Windows and OS X. The comparisons might slow down some when Microsoft actually releases a mind blowing OS that is more advanced than OS X, otherwise it's kinda hard to shut up the technically inclined who generally bring up valid points regardless if you want to hear about it or not.

Derek, you're apparently mistaken. When have I ever compared OS X to Windows? I've said this a hundred times before: I haven't used OS X and am not in a position to compare the two OSs. My comment was just a response to Bonch's statement, "I hate to bring Apple into this." I don't think so. Whether valid or not, people keep comparing the two OSs. I also wanted a clarification from lotsamystuff as to what he meant when he said OS X with 256MB memory performs better than an XP system with 2GB installed memory

I'm tired of the cop-out response from Microsoft about requiring a "modern CPU." How is that a measurable response for hardware requirements? Meanwhile, no technical Windows user would be surprised that WinXP needs a lot of memory to run the latest apps. I started with XP on 256 MB of RAM. My latest machine has 1 GB, and sometimes it just grinds. Expected? Yes. Acceptable? No, as usual. Will WinVista be better? Most likely, not.

"Sorry, bonch, but 512MB of RAM was woefully inadequate on my XP box (Pentium 4 processor)." I ran XP on 256MB of RAM for two years after its release with no issues, even running 3D Studio Max. "Derek, you're apparently mistaken. When have I ever compared OS X to Windows? I've said this a hundred times before: I haven't used OS X and am not in a position to compare the two OSs. My comment was just a response to Bonch's statement, "I hate to bring Apple into this." I don't think so. Whether valid or not, people keep comparing the two OSs." OF COURSE they'll be compared, OS X has outpaced Windows in every way, and most analysts agree it is the superior of the two operating systems. Microsoft has allowed Windows to stagnate. I said I hated to bring Apple into this because I KNEW you'd chime in with some reactionary statement because someone dared compare your precious Windows to something else. "I've said this a hundred times before: I haven't used OS X and am not in a position to compare the two OSs. " Next time you're bashing OS X, I'll bring up this statement. If you used OS X for a day, you'd probably understand where a lot of us are coming from. "I also wanted a clarification from lotsamystuff as to what he meant when he said OS X with 256MB memory performs better than an XP system with 2GB installed memory" As stated before, OS X's system requirements are 256MB of RAM, while Vista's for some reason require 512MB of RAM. I bet all those bloated XML-based vector graphics will suck up system memory like you wouldn't believe.

"Next time you're bashing OS X..." Find me one comment where I've bashed OS X. All I've been doing is defending Windows. You guys have no idea what you're talking about. The way you talk about Windows, it seems like you're comparing OS X to Windows 3.1. There is no reason for me to switch to Mac, since Windows does my job adequately. Whatever you guys say, the truth is, Windows is the market leader...and by a huge margin at that too.

I have used OS X. For more than a day. In fact I have to use it every day to test software on. It's a G4 with 512MB of ram. Once you get past the inital prettiness of the the freshly loaded UI and load up a couple of programs, performace is abysmal. ABYSMAL. Don't get me wrong, I don't mind using the Mac at all. The reason it sits on my desk is because everyone else in the office hates it. But wow. I find that the longer I test on it (webapps even, WEBAPPS!) the clunkier it feels. I find that I have to reboot it several times a day to get any kind of real performance out of it. By comparision, my XP box hasn't been rebooted in over 3 months and I never have a problem with it. Performance or otherwise. Every OS has minimum requirements. Those requirements tell us how much hardware it will take to load and run the OS. No one sticks to them. So what if Vista needs 512MB? I hate to bring cost into this but PC ram is so bloody cheap these days no one cares. Most new computers omce with 512MB standard and more and more are starting to come with 1024MB. By the time they get Vista on the shelves, a gig of ram will be the norm. I can walk into a PC store here and get a gig of ram for under $200 CDN. To upgrade to 2 gigs of ram on a mac is ... hmmm, let me check the Apple site... Wow. $360 CDN. Hell, even Macs come with 512MB minimum now. But it's harder for Apple users to up the ram because it costs so much more. As well, every, single review I've read on "standard configuration" Mac's say the same thing: "Besides throwing out the Apple Mousem you'll definately want to add more ram." Stabs at price aside, I believe Vista will run much, MUCH better than OS X simply because OS X heaps a goodly portion of it's UI onto the CPU. If you have a DX9 capabale video card, Vista will shove all of it's UI over to it, leaving the CPU and system ram open to handle what it was meant to: the OS and applications.

continued... ... and DX9 cards with Shader 2.0 capabilities are dirt cheap these days. There is even on board video that supports it.

*correction* "I can walk into a PC store here and get a gig of ram for under $200 CDN." I meant to say: I can walk into a PC store here and get TWO, ONE GIG STICKS of ram for under $200 CDN.

Paul -- I could have sworn that I saw this TechNet article MONTHS ago. I wouldn't call it the "official" Vista requirements (i.e., what you would find on the Vista box); these are more general guidelines for IT department purchasers. And regarding RAM usage... Personally, I have 768 MB on my XP box. And that is more than enough. The majority of the time, Windows is using less than 400 MB of it (the commit charge in Task Manager is < 400 MB). Haven't played around too much with Vista yet.

"Saying it requires 2GB of memory to work efficiently sounds a lot like your trying to spread FUD which might be a little easier if XP hadn't been around for 4 years already." I didn't say it requires 2GB of memory. I said that's what I upgraded it to, and it runs adequately WITH that amount of memory. Running a single program with 512 was never a problem on the DELL; multitasking was an issue. Right now on my Mac, I have 19 programs open, and everything runs like a charm. I've can burn DVDs and import video at the same time, while running Safari and automatically checking mail in the background every three minutes. In fact, that's de rigueur around here. On the XP Box (Again, a Pentium 4), I couldn't do ANYTHING while Nero was burning a DVD before I upgraded the memory. Well, I could--if I wanted to wait 3 minutes for Internet Explorer to open. XP runs fine with the memory I put in it. It might run fine with less. But for multitasking, it ran like crap with 512. That's not FUD or misinformation, it's the truth. Sorry if you didn't understand my meaning the first time around. I hope you get it this time.

"So, lotsa..., you say that an XP PC with 2 GB memory is not as good as a PowerBook with 256MB memory" No. I didn't say that. You might want to look up a psychological term called "projection", because you seem to read a lot into what I actually write. I never specified the amount of memory in the Mac I was referring to, but for the record, it's an 867 MHz PowerPC G4, 2MB L3 cache, 1.25GB RAM. And when it comes to multitasking, it smokes the Pentium 4 running at 2.8 GHz with double the memory. Sorry, but it's true...especially when burning DVDs or importing/encoding video. The PC just can't keep up. A PowerBook with 256MB of memory running anything other than basic apps would probably be painfully slow.

"It's harder for Apple users to up the ram because it costs so much more." That's disingenuous at best, and you know it. Go to crucial.com and you'll find that RAM for your Mac is no more expensive than ram for your DELL or eMachine, or other PC. Yeah, it's ridiculously expensive at Apple's website, but don't spout crap that you know isn't true.

"You might want to look up a psychological term called "projection", because you seem to read a lot into what I actually write." It's your fault. You didn't specify the amount of RAM on your mac. Naturally, I assumed that you were using the base configuration (which Bonch suggested). I find my Windows Desktop PC with 512MB RAM and and 3.2GHz processor more than enough for my needs. I do a lot of VB and C programming on it and it works really well. In addition, I browse the net on Firefox and IE and Outlook runs in the background, collecting my mail every 5 minutes. Not one problem.

" I do a lot of VB and C programming on it and it works really well. In addition, I browse the net on Firefox and IE and Outlook runs in the background, collecting my mail every 5 minutes. Not one problem." With all due respect, shark, those are pretty lightweight tasks, and a Windows Box with a 3.2GHz processor and 512 MB shouldn't have any problem whatsoever with something so relatively simple. But the fact remains, that for more complex multitasking, my PC needed a lot more RAM and horsepower to do the work of my lower-end Mac. I'll admit to being somewhat shocked by this, but truth is just truth.

Bonch & Lotsamystuff. If I am understanding it correctly, you are now making a point that Mac OS X is better, because Apple's own system requirements for it are less than Microsoft's requirements for a completely different operating system? Yes, they both have shiney graphics effects, but there is allot more that an OS has to do besides render an interface, and Vista may well be coming with more features out of the box than Mac OS X - although I doubt that idea will stick with either of you :p Also, the requirements Paul lists are fairly vauge - how modern does a CPU have to be to count? What are the differing memory requirements in the different editions of Vista? I'm fairly confident that a user with Home Basic will not need to have the same hardware resources as someone trying to use Vista Ultimate.

I am an IT Manager for a medium sized software company. We have 250 desktops and laptops all running XP Pro. All of the machines have 512MB with 3x page files with the exception of our development staff which are running at 1GB. My basic users have multiple apps open (CRM apps, office products, financial products, etc...) and have no problems with speed. The development staff have tons of apps open including Delphi, Visual Studio and other .Net applications and have no issues with the exception of compiling which takes a bit but I think thats Hard Drive speed then anything. All of our staff are on a five year life cycle and we only buy new machines meaning our oldest machine was bought April 2001 (I think the slowest ones are 2.0ghz). In Summary, we run apps of all kinds (including video and audio stuff) and XP Pro runs fine on 512MB with multiple apps open. You just have to know how to configure it to do so.