How well does Windows XP run on 64 Megabytes of ram?

Question

I have an old computer I found in the closit, since I put windows ME on it, I am using it alot lately for a couple of my older games such as Diablo 2, or Starcraft. but anyways, I saw the requirements for Windows XP Home and it said 64MB but 128 MB is recommended. How well will this run, the Mhz on this thing is 553MHz.

-Thank you

Answer 1

It will run horribly, if at all. Windows XP needs a minimum of 256MB to run properly.

Answer 2

It will run poorly at best. I have an old HP that came with 128 MB RAM that I use for my older games. I installed XP Home as it was equipped with Windows 98. It was a disaster. It took almost 10 minutes just to boot up and that was with a hard drive format and fresh install. All around performance was very poor. I ended up reformatting and installing Windows 2000 Professional and that worked much better. The game that I mainly use it for is Sid Meier's Pirates! Gold. The game would not run particularly well with XP (very choppy). It was flawless with 2000 Pro.

Also FYI, you can typically get pretty cheap memory from places like crucial.com for those older systems. I upgraded the HP from 128 MB to 256 MB for about $50. That drastically improved performance.

Answer 3

It will run but it won't run very good. 64 mb isn't enough RAM to run XP smoothly. There will be a lot of data swapping to disc as XP will use the hard drive for virtual memory since it won't have enough standard memory to store temporary data. That will slow the system WAY down. RAM is cheap nowadays. Go get 256 or, better yet, 512 :o)

Answer 4

Sounds like an ancient piece of hardware, so XP would run VERY slowly on that old PC (even though it's slow enough with Windows on it, lol). Just to be safe, I would do a complete overhaul on your hardware. Judging from the processor speed (either it's a Pentium II or Pentium III), that's in desperate (repeat DESPERATE) need of an upgrade. But, if you're not very computer savvy when you put all of your new hardware in your old PC, just get a new system. I would recommend the higher-end version of the 20" iMac; you can run Windows on it (only XP and Vista), but you should wait until Leopard is released to take full advantage of this.

If you want to upgrade your PC, you should upgrade it to the following:
- 1 GB RAM (newest standard)
- A motherboard with an Intel Pentium 4 (with 2.0GHZ or higher)
- 128 MB VRAM (also known as GPU)
- 100 GB Hard drive or higher
- Wireless card (both Bluetooth and Wifi)
- USB/Firewire port enabled
- DVD±RW/CD±RW Drive
- Some good anti virus/anti spy software (preferably something from Norton, PC Tools, or McAffee)

Good luck!

Answer 5

It barely runs on an old P4 1.7MHZ with 256MB RAM that I have, after installing Service Pack 2..

Stick with ME until you can afford a newer PC.



.

Answer 6

It will work but be very slow. I recommend you stick with the windows me you really aren't missing alot of differences besides look.

Answer 7

I would not work good at all. I have a 600MHZ laptop with 364mb memory and it runs pretty good. I would like more memory though.

Answer 8

It would crap all over the place even if it had 150 mb of ram.
That would be fun to watch!

Answer 9

it will probibly b fine the first couple of days n u think it will be great but it will soon get so slow u will not stand using it.

Answer 10

XP will "Barely" run on your system...if at all & will be painfully SLOW... You really need a new computer...