In this article, the terms “memory” and “RAM” are used interchangeably; they both mean the same thing.

This evening I’ve been running Microsoft Windows 7 with 2 GBs of RAM, as I promised, though I am late in getting this report written.  I apologize for that.

Typical PC Usage:

All of my common programs are running.  I have not made any exceptions to my behavior.

Typical PC usage has been unaffected by reducing the system memory to 2 GBs.  Windows 7 has managed this well, and honestly I had forgotten that I had removed two sticks of memory from my computer.  The boot time did not seem any longer than usual, but perhaps I wasn’t paying enough attention to notice (on the other hand, it didn’t increase boot time long enough to force me to notice).

Browsing the folders on my computer did access the page file (the cache on the hard drive) a bit more frequently, and I may have noticed a very minute occasional pause when accessing more heavily populated folders.

Browsing the web using Firefox and making heavy use of multiple tabs did not create any noticeable slow down in Firefox.

Opening a large GIF file did have a slight pause, but opening a PDF file in Foxit Reader did not have any noticeable decrease in speed.

Opening an 86 MB self-extracting archive was quick and simple, and moving the same 86 MB file to the recycle bin was equally hitch-free.

In general, such daily mundane tasks such as browsing the web, checking email, opening / saving / closing files and the like were not significantly affected by reducing Windows 7 to 2 GBs of memory.

Multimedia Playback

Playback of a normal definition video file off of the hard drive was as smooth as it was with 4 GBs of RAM.

Playing a 1080p high definition video file off of the hard drive was also as smooth (and as beautiful) as ever.

Streaming video files off of the web went flawlessly.  You should have no problems watching Youtube or Hulu when using 2 GBs of memory in Windows 7.

Streaming high definition went without any problems, as well.

Generally speaking, multimedia worked flawlessly.

Gaming

Game play was affected, though it will probably be doable.

Mass Effect had some graphical artifacts that I had not previously noticed.  I didn’t catch any screen shots of it because they flashed by far too quickly for me to get a shot.  It was uncommon, but certainly noticeable.  Game play in this test consisted of some fire fights, dialogue, and general running about.

Above:  Mass Effect’s Resource Usage

World of Warcraft surprised me.  Frankly I expected it to have no problems; I almost didn’t bother loading it to test it.  The reality is that it certainly was effected.  WoW in Windows 7 with 2 GBs of RAM experienced an increase in the amount of swapping.  The length of each access would best be described as a “burst”.  They were not exactly constant, of course, but they were frequent.  Game play in this test consisted of swimming around, quickly moving the camera, moving quickly between “above” and “below” water, and fighting mobs as well as some general running around.

Above:  World of Warcraft’s Resource Usage

Bottom Line:  Gaming appears to feel the decrease to 2 GBs of RAM the most, and, generally speaking, I would recommend that gamers aspire to 4 GBs of memory for their Windows 7 gaming needs.  Everything else seems to work quite well enough with 2 GBs of memory.

It’s now about 1:38 AM so it’s time for me to get to bed.  I hope that this post has been useful to some of you, and I wish you all a good night.

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