Vista questions... Mostly Ultimate 64 Bit...

CJLMTLCA

Hard drive is constantly working. After boot-up, program installs, un-installs,
even closing firefox... is this the performance analyzer, or whatever it's called?
HD will burn out before SP1 is released.

What size pagefile does vista recommend when you have 4gb of ram?

what is your memory usage % when you have 4gb of ram (idle or low usage)?

Have you tried PC Backup? Vs Ghost? With ghost if you have HD failure, you
just replace the drive, boot from the ghost CD and restore your image.
I guess with vista it has to be done after you install the os first?

With Speedboost enabled, HD works at the same time as the USB key. Isn't
the USB key supposed to alleviate HD usage?

Is it true you have to install Vista with 2gb of ram and then add the
other 2 gigs because of a bug?

Erroneus

The HDD activty can be due to the file search index running, it will do that when machine is not under heavy load and offcourse more in the beginning, since it's working on building up the file index database.

I'm guessing you are thinking about readyboost I would guess it does use the files from the usb key, but also sets "when accessed" on the files on the hdd, and therefore it would look like it's working on both "disks".

Zelig

1. The hard drive activity goes on until your ram fills up, it should taper off after that.

2. Leave the pagefile on auto, on all your drives that it's acceptable to have a pagefile on. (ie. the root drive, and any other internal drives, Vista will use the fastest ones automatically)

3. With 4gb, 10 programs (music, file transfer, browser, IM, etc.) open, I'm currently at 39% memory utilization, so 61% cached, task manager reports 0 MB free.

4. I'd assume so, someone else who knows this better may want to answer.

5. Speedboost is supposed to improve performance, I'm not sure that there was any claim made to reduce HDD usage. Actually, I'm pretty sure it won't, because everything on the USB key is put on the HDD as well, so that you don't lose data if you pull the key out.

6. Not sure about this one, but I think so. Or you can slipstream the appropriate patch onto the install. Or you can disable memory hole in the BIOS, to bring the memory down to 3 GB while you install.

By deault, indexing only indexes users folders and the start menu, so this should actually be much better than XP, where it indexed everything. (And was in turn disabled by most people)

temeteus82

I got Ghost (closed beta) running on Vista 64 no problems at all.

CJLMTLCA

I have a chance to fool around with Vista and just using the opportunity to decide if i should upgrade and to what version... Along with some hardware upgrades too..

So, indexing was turned off. Just like on my personal systems, I always turn off that function.

On a 2gb machine, the ram was always 600 - 1200mb full. Just wanted to know if increasing to 4gb will increase overhead or it will take half of that amount too.

Readyboost, speedboost, steadyboot, roundboobs, whatever it's called, i know there are 2 OO's , i guess i miss-understood the purpose. It makes sense to keep files on the HD too, like you said Zelig, in case the key gets pulled out.

I usually make a small partition on secondary disk and move the pagefile there, or at least make the min and max values the same. i'm still curious what the recommended amount is under 4 gigs of ram...

I did some more searching and there is a hotfix for the 4 gig install bug. KB929777.

temeteus82, is that Ghost 12?

Zelig

Like I mentioned, indexing is much improved in Vista. I always disabled it completely in XP, but I generally leave it enabled now for the start menu and my documents.

600 - 1200 mb isn't really "overhead", a lot of this is in both ram and swap, and if anything is opened which needs to use ram, the application gets priority. In any case, it shouldn't go up with 4gb of ram, if I close all my applications, I get around 3300 MB of ram cached.

Recommended size for the pagefile is to let the system manage it. Or if on a 32-bit system, I usually just set it to a constant 4gb size on each disk.

temeteus82

14 they skipped 13

CJLMTLCA

Ok, if you insist
and why not constant on 64 bit?

Noooooooooo... I wanted 13! That woud be a cool name : Ghost 13
How's it going? Should i pick up 12 or wait for 14?

temeteus82

I bet you would like to have that

Yeah it looks good but it's sill in early beta stage.

Ferret_Style

Readyboost is basically a cheap way to add ram but using flash memory. It is not to replace harddrive swapping but to suppliment the ram. Any system over 2 gigs of ram really does not need it as it just basically adds more ram.

As scary as it sounds i use the windows backup feature in ultimate and love it. Had to restore a few times (dum mistakes on my part) and it has always worked well. Even have it scheduled to back up my system once a week.

CJLMTLCA

Technically, it IS the thirteenth version, so if i buy it i will rename the shortcut to Ghost 13... and i WILL have Ghost 13! Muhahaha...

Even with 4 gigs you can use it to speed up boot, no? Doesn't it cache startup prgs on the key?

Ok good. This feature might eliviate the price difference between Ultimate and Premium (Ultimate or Premium+Ghost). So it images the entire computer? Can you pick drives and/or partitions specifically? Can you browse the backup image and say restore 1 file?

dipstick

System Protection causes the most HD activity on my setup. Once I disable it everything quiets down.

sauced

Yes and no, well i experienced blue screens wich could come from the swap of hard drives i made, but in most cases you shouldnt experience any problems installing with 4gb ram.

I had ultimate for 5 months now and everytime i have been installing with 4GB without any problems, i think its safe for you to try it out.