I've been running SAM on windows2k for years now and I'm noticing that every few days SAM will throw some cannot read memory exceptions then soon afterwards shut down. This was with the most stable 3.3.2

I've experienced this with 4.3.6 as well, but more often on my win2k machine. I've even upgraded to 2GB memory on a 3.2 pentium. Same problems. So I downgraded back to 3.3.2 and have to deal with SAM shutting down every few days. I have minimal software set up on this machine and about 95% of the time my avant browser, SAM, and VNC are the only things running.

The only thing left for me to try is to upgrade the OS to XP but i'd like to hear from you guys which OS handles SAM the best.

For what it is worth, You're best to upgrade to XP. XP is not like it was some 4 or 5 years ago where it was full of bugs. (On the contrary, right now Vista is.) Most of the DJs that I have stats for are either on Vista or XP. I won't allow a user with 2k, ME, or NT. You're just asking for trouble if you do.

Ditch 2K and get with the times. I know it's hard to let something go that you're comfortable with, however, here's a good one, I used to run Windows 98 First edition, and went right to XP.

It's just that much easier on your PC and all of those processes.

SAM 4.3.6 and WinXP. Never a burp, belch, hiccup, stutter, skip or lock.

i suppose when it comes to running SAM, XP Home is just as good as XP Pro right?

I will say YES. I have HOME on one of my SAM machines, and PRO on another. works perfectly with both.

Same here. Been running everything from SAM 2.8.3 up to 4.2.2 for years now on the same ole machine, using Win/XP Home plus SP2 installed. Never a glitch (this machine is running 24/7 and gets restarted about once or twice a year only!).

Finally got my hands on winxp home upgrade (craigslist is the ish!!!) and installed it. After a few bumps in the road, all seems good... (so far.)

Thanks for the feedback!

xp is great, but you're still running alot more CPU usage then you'll need to straight out of the box. I use windows 2003 server b/c its stripped down to the bare essentails and it gives more memory and cpu to allow the computer to run the real programs that matter (Sam Broadcaster, NO-IP, etc)

BUT. if you must use XP, then go to the system preferences and click the button "adjust for best performance"
its not as sexy, but deff helps if you don't have a monster machine

This is actually a very good tip. I also set mine to »Optimize performance for system cache« (as opposed to »… for programs«).

On some XP systems, to avoid some problems with »microphone stuttering when talking over crossfades«, it also helps to set »Config/Audio mixer pipeline« to »above normal« (second notch from the left) instead of »High« (3rd notch from left).

On real slow systems, it might also help to set the »Design« to »Windows (classic)« and set »folder options« for all folders to not display tasks at the left, open all folders in the same window and switch off »[_] Save display options for each folder separately« (under »Display/Files and Folders«).

Please excuse if the menu options are not 100% correct—I’m currently sitting in front of a German XP and just did a rough translation. I guess you’ll find what I mean.

After all these months of trying to get it to work with xp home, i'm still having the same problems. This leads me to believe there must be a problem with the motherboard.

Don't know if I mentioned it or not but I built this machine. All other software runs fine, so I'm puzzled as to why it only has problems with SAM. I hate to drop about $400 for a new box but it looks like I might have to.

If you don't mind, what kind of machine do you all run SAM on? The PC that I built for SAM (I'm a hardware novice) has the following specs. Do you see anything wrong here?

Intel Pentium 4 3.2GHz
1GB PC3200 DDR SDRAM (Corsair)
Western Digital 150GB
Seagate 120GB
ABIT Motherboard (Model AS8-V)

If you can, try swapping out the memory for a new memory stick. I'm running mine on an old PC using half the memory and HD you have in your specs and never a problem with it. But I also use Windows Server 2003 (so it's a true server, not a desktop masquerading as a server) so it's quite stable.... at some point, I want to buy a bigger server ( with at least a terabyte)... but from what I can tell, the specs are OK. Something you might want to do (if you can) is maybe shutting SAM down for a few days, see if the problem presents itself. If it does, then you'll probably want to run some kind of diagnostics on it to see if you've got a bad hardware component.