Amount of RAM and Power Options

[andyk]

I am rethinking if my ThinkPad can benefit with more memory. With my desktop (single channel), I didn’t notice any difference going from 256MB to 512MB. Going from 256MB to 512MB only made going in and out of Hibernation take longer. So I went back to 256MB. By the way, I only shut the machine down if I need to mess with the hardware.

I don’t do graphics or multimedia work and I don’t play 3D games.

This week BestBuy is selling PNY 256MB PC2700 DDR SoDIMM for $25 after rebate. The ThinkPad I am buying will come with 256MB. I am wondering if I should upgrade it to 512MB for only $25 (I know, $25 is so trivial compared to a $2-3k machine). This page has several links. It seems performance does improve, but not much:

http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=304454

To me, the added performance is not worth the penalty with Hibernation. I’d appreciate you sharing your rational:

If you insist on 512MB or even 1GB and you do NOT do multimedia work, what’s the benefit of getting that much memory?


Also, when you are not using your ThinkPad, do you set it to just go into Standby? When you take it with you, do you shut it down or put it into Hibernation?


Thank you very much for sharing your experiences.

[JHEM]

Going from 256MB to 512MB only made going in and out of Hibernation take longer. So I went back to 256MB. By the way, I only shut the machine down if I need to mess with the hardware.

Why in the world would you hibernate a desktop? The savings in bootup time would be negligible. Plus, hibernating IS shutting down, so it would be perfectly safe to work on the internals of a hibernated machine, with the exception of changing the HD.

Adding memory is usually the quickest and cheapest way to improve a laptop's performance.

Also, when you are not using your ThinkPad, do you set it to just go into Standby? When you take it with you, do you shut it down or put it into Hibernation?

99% of the time when I'm travelling my Thinkpads are in standby, not shutdown or hibernated.

Regards,

James

[cynic]

I travel in standby too. I have it set to do the effcient hibernation thing which means if my laptop is in standby for over 3 hrs, it goes into hibernation and starts to write the file earlier so their is no delay to switch from standby to hibernate. These settings are all in windows.

(BTW, 512MB is a must IMO. There are more processes that run on a laptop than a desktop in the background for power management and the P-M chips seem to like 512MB; over 512MB becomes your call based on applications.)

[ryan]

I'm a big fan of the cliche, "if there's nothing wrong, don't fix it."

I'm still not entirely sure of what you use your computer for, but multimedia applications aren't the only ones that work dramatically better when you add RAM. For instance, I use Microsoft Visual Studio .NET 2003 for developing programs, and that eats up tons of memory. My uncle often uses Java, and many of its developing environments eat up tons of memory as well. That's just one instance. I also notice that I have lots of programs open at the same time, which is an instance of lots of little things eating up lots of memory. My mom's notebook has a slow hard drive (and when you run out of RAM the OS starts swapping stuff back and forth from RAM to the hard drive, hince 'virtual memory'). So when I have enough things open to exceed 256mb, which happens often, I notice huge slowdowns, we'll upgrade this computer's memory ASAP.

My point is that if you're not in any situation like those where slowdowns are noticeble, there's no reason to upgrade your RAM. A way to tell if you're lack of RAM is in fact to blame for a bottleneck is to hit ctrl+alt+esc and to go ot the Performance tab. Then recreate the bottleneck, and watch if CPU usage is up at 100% for a prolonged period, and if your physical RAM is completely used up. It's bound to be one or the other or both. If it's just RAM or RAM and CPU, then upgrading RAM will help, obviuosly. If it's just the CPU upgrading RAM may in fact hurt (though probably not by much).

[andyk]

James,

Thanks for the reply. With my 256MB desktop:

Go into Hibernation: 20 seconds
Come out of Hibernation: 10 seconds

Shutdown: 10+ seconds (time for "savings your settings" varies, so this may be 15+ seconds)
Reboot: 25 seconds, plus 10 seconds to load stuff in Startup folder.

With my desktop, I simply put it into Standby (which is practically instantaneous) if I am not using it. The desktop is set to go into Hibernation 45 minutes after Standby on its own. So my penalty compared to leaving it always on is only 10 seconds (versus at least 25 seconds with Reboot).

With Hibernation, I also get to keep all the old states and all the open applications. For example, if Winamp is in the mid of a song or I am half way through a document.

When I change a piece of hardware, the memory state changes. So the computer must be shut down and reboot.

[andyk]

Thanks cynic and ryan.

My degrees were in CS/ECE/EE. When I was writing code (C/C++/Java), I typically didn't use an IDE. Yes, those IDEs can take up quite a bit of memory. I do remember it was swapping quite a bit when I had to use WebSphere for a particular Web Services development.

I am going to law school in the fall. So I suppose I won't need that much memory. But cynic also mentioned that notebook has a lot more applets.

With my desktop, I typically have 80MB physical memory available but a 140MB page file. I think I will just follow ryan's suggestion -- get more memory WHEN I need it.

Also, thanks to all the suggestions about Power Options. I think I will just put the laptop into Standby. Then have it go to into Hiberneration on its own after a few hours (time it so I would be home by then after school).

[Chun-Yu]

Another factor you have to think about when you upgrade your RAM is the size of your hibernation file. After I upgraded from 512 -> 1280 MB, I ditched hibernation completely to get my 1.25 GB back, since I rarely ever used hibernation in the first place. I usually just use suspend.

[mtj]

What typical suspend durations are possible with the 9-cell battery, and how does one configure to "suspend for now, but wake up and hibernate if things get desparate on the battery front" as was suggested in a prior post?

Thanks!

[andyk]

I am probably not doing this correctly because it's been so long. According to the HMM,

6 cell battery pack is rated at 4.4 Ah (10.8 Volts 4400 mAh)

9 cell battery pack is rated at 6.6 Ah

So a full 9 cell has 71.3 watt-hour?

If we use this http://www.terranovum.com/projects/ener ... hiber.html

So if Standby consumes 2.5 watts, you get 28 hours?


In Power Options, if System standby is "After 15 mins" and System hibernates is "After 1 hour", then it will go into Hibernation 45 minutes after you put it into Standby.

I don't know which tool would do this automatically based on battery level.

[Chun-Yu]

That 2.5W figure is for a desktop...I think a notebook would use even less. Standby seems to use about 1% of the battery every hour with the 6-cell (and obviously, even less %-wise with the 9-cell).

[andyk]

Hmm... I think Chun-Yu is trying to convince me to not even bother with Hibernation. I will give that a try, thanks!

[cynic]

To give you an idea of the different number of processes... my desktop usually idles with 13 to 20 processes, my laptop idles with 46 to 50 processes. Obviously a big difference and they don't really take up processing but they do take up RAM (I usually idle at 1% CPU usage)

As for the power settings, I do the standby for now, hibernate if I'm in standby too long because I sometimes will forget how I closed my laptop when I throw it in my bag and standby takes about 2%/every 6 hours while hibernate takes nothing. (9 cell battery and yes, 72 is correct for it)

Start>Control Panel>Power Options>Alarms you can set when the system will go to hibernate based on battery-life (which is monitored even when in standby)

Using the IBM battery maximiser method, I just put the standby time to what I want (which is usually never) but I put the hibernate time to 3 hours--I do this for both my AC and On-Battery settings. I have the close-lid option to put it into standby (which is done from the above Power Options Control Panel stated above), so when I close the lid the system drops immediately into standby. Since nothing happens with the laptop in 3 hours, the hibernate function will trump the standby and place it into hibernate.

[geobel]

Plus, hibernating IS shutting down, so it would be perfectly safe to work on the internals of a hibernated machine, with the exception of changing the HD.

Well... My T40 does not wake up properly from hibernation even if I just hibernate in port replicator and wake up without... To my memory connecting/disconnecting external monitor when on standby or hibernation often (or always?) confuses laptops. I would expect same applies to changes in hardware.

Gosha

[cynic]

Well... My T40 does not wake up properly from hibernation even if I just hibernate in port replicator and wake up without... To my memory connecting/disconnecting external monitor when on standby or hibernation often (or always?) confuses laptops. I would expect same applies to changes in hardware.

Gosha

That's true. When the system comes out of hibernation, all the hardware needs to be connected exactly the same (including which USB port is used for which device sine XP addresses the drivers to the specific port)

[andyk]

cynic, very nice summary of a "best practice". Thank you very much.

[mtj]

Thank you andyk, Chun-Yu, and cynic for taking the time to share your excellent advice. Now I know how to set up the suspend/hibernate mode when my Thinkpad (2373HTU) gets here tomorrow!

[katman]

I have a 1GB memory, but it posts as 1022MB is that right? Thanks...

[G-Man]

100 percently.

Regards,
G-Man