What are the pros & cons of various amounts of ram on XP Home, I am running an ASRock Conroe1333-D667, I think it is decent run of the mill board. I have a gig of Corsair, was thinking of bumping it to two, Photo Shop is the only hog program on the machine.

Phil

You can go up to 3 gigs of memory with Windows XP but it won't recognize all of it. If you want to use more than 3 gigs you will have to upgrade to a 64 bit operating system. You can install more than 3 gigs on Windows XP 32 bit but windows wont even see it.

Thanks I am considering going to teo gigs but not sure if it will benefit me much for what I do with the machine.

Phil

I like to balance the amount of ram with the computer and it's uses, PS is a hog but a good one, if you have a dual core and multitask then 2 gigs might get some use, if you only do lighter tasks then it's a waste

monitor it with task manager, if your page file use doesn't go up when doing your normal routine including some heavier tasks with photoshop and you still have a couple of hundred megs free of physical ram then adding a gig won't help

Gamers today need that second gig to preload all the scenery