Buying a computer for Vista ... and beyond

Tanks full of memories

Forget about 512MB of memory. It may sound like we're going out on a limb here, but we'd suggest a 1GB minimum for notebooks and 2GB for desktops. If you're doing real work with your laptop (using it as a desktop replacement that you transit between home and work, for example), then shoot for 2GB right off the bat, especially if it has an integrated (chip set) graphics solution that shares system memory.

Why the severe departure from Microsoft's recommendation? Memory is one of the more critical system factors. Everything uses it. With Vista bulking up on security, all of the optional memory-resident software that you might have installed on XP is no longer optional. Also, as application software begins to more fully utilize multiple cores, the demand on memory will increase.

This is important, because when Windows finds itself low on system memory, it starts using your hard drive in its place. You never, ever want to give Windows the opportunity to go to your hard drive except when your application needs to write or retrieve data. The performance drop when polling into and out of memory to and from a hard drive is immense -- and the default hard drives found in most portable computers are even slower than those of their desktop counterparts.

Both AMD's AM2 processors and Intel's CPUs now use DDR2 memory, so that's a no-brainer. What no one will probably explain to you is that "dual-channel" memory is a faster way to go. This simply means that whatever final amount of memory you select, it should be in multiples of two. For example, a 1GB choice would be composed of two 512MB sticks, 2GB could be either two 1GB sticks or four 512MB sticks, and so on.

You'll also see bandwidth ratings attached to memory (PC-4200, 533-MHz bus; PC-5300, 667-MHz bus; and so on). The larger the number, the higher the bandwidth. Your computer vendor will recommend the correct bandwidth for the PC you're buying. It's matched to the motherboard in the system. Circumventing the recommendation adds nothing.

Higher-bandwidth memory is most often associated with higher-performance computers or processors used with high-demand applications such as video, large-scale graphics editing or gaming. You'll pay extra for it, and if you don't need it, you're wasting your money.