I’ve been offered a used 1GB DDR1 PC2700 RAM for half the price a new stick currently fetches in the market. My ThinkPad currently uses 1 x 512MB and 1×256MB. If I were to buy it, I’d have to replace the 256MB stick with the 1GB which makes it 1.5GB RAM in total.

The difference between running Windows XP on 768MB vs 1.5GB is staggering. The operating system loads faster, windows open faster, programs stay on memory longer so when you re-open it, it’s a lot faster. I might just take up the offer for the used 1GB notebook RAM.

However, if you’re using WIndows Vista, I’d recommend you buy memory in excess of 2GB. Preferrably 4GB considering RAM is so cheap nowadays. Vista crawls when run in systems with less than 2GB RAM. In any case, if you do not need the bells and whistles of Vista, downgrade to a regular XP instead. You’d experience a much faster and responsive computer.