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COMPUTER BITS BY JASON COLE Windows 95: what it really needs in terms of hardware What sort of hardware do you need to run Windows 95? How much RAM do you need? We take a look at what’s really needed to make the most of Windows 95. On the side of the Windows 95 upgrade box it states that it will work on a computer with a 386 processor, 4Mb of RAM and 40Mb of available space on the hard disc drive (HDD). That is correct – it will run on such a system but then my car will run on 50ml of petrol! It won’t go far but it will run and so will Windows 95. Unfortunately, any program that you want to run will be slow and tedious which is exactly what a computer is not meant to be. My personal minimum recommendation for running Windows 95 is a 486 DX4 100MHz CPU, 16Mb of RAM and a 500Mb HDD. It will work with 8Mb of RAM but you will still have trouble running programs. A nice Windows 95 system will have a 133MHz Pentium or equivalent processor, 32Mb of RAM and a 1.6 gigabyte (1.6Gb) HDD. That is what it really takes if you want real performance but why? Access Memory and is the area where the programs are loaded. If you have 8Mb of RAM, for example, then you can only load 8Mb worth of programs into memo­ry. When it comes to RAM, 8Mb is not a lot and indeed Windows 95, with all its associated Dynamic The microprocessor The CPU can be considered as the brains of the system. This is where all the calculations are done so it stands to reason that the higher its MHz rating (ie, 120, 133, 166 or 200MHz), the faster it can do these calculations. The term “RAM” stands for Random 16  Silicon Chip Link Libraries (DLLs), plus a program such as Word Ver.7 will actually gobble up more than 8Mb. In fact, the .exe file for Word alone is about 3.85Mb. The magical swapfile Of course, we can run both Win- dows 95 and Word Ver.7 on a system with just 8Mb of RAM, so how does Windows achieve this? It does it by means of a device called a swapfile, which is simply a reserved area on the hard disc that the system treats as memory when it runs out of real memory. When the computer wants to access a part of memory, it goes to the required memory location and reads or writes to it. Howev­er when it runs out of places to write the data, it grabs a segment of RAM, copies it to the swapfile, and uses the now free RAM for the new data. So, by using the hard disc, your system has much more memory available to it than just the amount of RAM. Unfortunate­ly, there’s a downside to swapping data from RAM to the hard disc and that’s speed. When the computer accesses the RAM, it typically only takes 70 nanoseconds (70ns). However, when it needs to write to the hard disc drive, it first has to find the swapfile in the file allocation table (FAT), then locate the actual sector on the drive, wait for the start of the sector, write to it and finally, update the FAT. And that can take quite some time. In fact, compared with the 70ns access time for RAM, it’s an eternity. That is why Windows, whether it be 3.x or 95, can be slow with only 8Mb RAM. The sweet spot for Windows 95 is 24Mb RAM. With 24Mb, Wind­ ows 95 is fully loaded into memory and therefore the only real thing slowing down the computer will be the speed of the CPU. With this much RAM, you can load Word and Excel and work at a nice rate. 32Mb enables you to load even more programs and run them in RAM at once, while having a few open Word and Excel Docu­ments. As a matter of fact, I run my computer with 64Mb of RAM and I rarely see the HDD light turn on except when I load a program or save a document. It takes me a few seconds to load Word but after that ini­tial loading the program is cached in memory so that if I close it and then load it again it will only take a couple of seconds Even if I quickly load a graphics program before reloading Word, it still takes only a couple of seconds because there is plenty of RAM to go around. Hard disc drives RAM is not the only thing that can slow down Windows 95. Windows is continually loading and unloading data in the back­ground and if you have a slow HDD then it’s going to take longer to do the job. Western Digital offer a series of drives that really do perform very well in terms of speed, reliability and price. I personally prefer the Western Digital Caviar series Enhanced IDE HDDs for a Windows system. These drives operate at 5200 rpm and are good, cost-effective units for both home and business sys­tems. Alternatively, if you have the money, you could go for a SCSI-based unit such as the Seagate Barracuda which operates at 7200 rpm but I will tell you more about HDDs another time. In summary, it’s really a matter of having the right ingre­dients – a reasonable amount of RAM, a fast CPU and a decent HDD. But that’s not all. A decent motherboard is also required and it also helps to have a “real” video card. Software updates A few changes have been made to Windows 95 since its offi­cial release to enhance its capabilities. These updates are available as Service Pack 1, which also has a couple of added extras such as an update information tool. There have also been a few updates to the Internet Explorer which retails for the lovely price of $0.00. That’s right, it costs nothing! We are now up to Version 3 (the Win95 Upgrade Pack has Version 2) and I recommend that you use the latest version if you intend exploring the internet. If you don’t have it, ask around or download it from www.microsoft.com. It is not really necessary to install the service pack on home systems that are generally used for games, as the areas it affects will seldom (if ever) be used. Conversely, it is always a good idea to install any service pack that comes out if the computer is used in a business environment. Service packs are often brought out not only to enhance current features but also to fix obscure bugs and to allow some new programs to work correct­ly. A new Win95 Recently, a new version of Windows 95 was released but this is only available as an OEM (original equipment manufacturer) product. This basically means that you can’t buy it unless you are buying a new computer. The new version is called Windows 95 Service Release 2 (SR2). It includes all the updates as part of the new system plus various other improvements, including the option of a 32-bit FAT system. In the older Windows 95, the 16-bit FAT is located at the edge of the drive and the cluster size is dependent on the drive size, although some third party programs allow you to change the cluster size to a certain extent. With the FAT 32 system, howev­er, the root directory can be located anywhere on the drive and the cluster size is just 4Kb for partitions up to 8Gb. In addition, the largest partition size available for a FAT 16 system is 2Gb, while for a FAT 32 system it can go as high as 2Tb (terabytes). If you want the features offered by the Service Release 2 version of Windows 95 but don’t want a new computer, you won’t have to wait long. The new features should all be included in Windows 97, due for release later this year. In summary, you will not get the most out of Windows 95 if your hardware is not good enough. It’s cruel how the best soft­ware packages require the best hardware but if you shop around and choose carefully, you can get a fast machine that can really handle Windows 95. Fortunately, computer prices have dropped dramatically in SC the last 12 months. SMART ® FASTCHARGERS Brings you advanced technology at affordable prices As featured in ‘Silicon Chip’ Jan. ’96 This REFLEX® charger charges single cells or battery packs from 1.2V to 13.2V and 110mAh to 7Ah. VERY FAST CHARGING. Standard batteries in maximum 1 hour, fast charge batteries in max. 15 minutes AVOID THE WELL KNOWN MEMORY EFFECT. NO NEED TO DISCHARGE. Just top up. This saves time and also extends the life of the batteries. SAVE MONEY. Restore most Nicads with memory effect to remaining capacity and rejuvenate many 0V worn-out Nicads EXTEND THE LIFE OF YOUR BATTERIES Recharge them up to 3000 times. 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