Test Developed Apps in Both 512MB RAM and 256MB RAM Emulators in Windows Phone

In this tutorial we are going to see how to test the windows phone application developed in both 512MB ram targeted devices and also 256MB ram devices. This feature is available with the latest Windows Phone SDK 7.1.1, download and install the package using the link Windows Phone SDK 7.1.1 Update. With this update, you can more easily develop apps and games that are optimized to run on 256-MB devices. This update also includes a new 256-MB version of Windows Phone Emulator, an updated 512-MB version of Windows Phone Emulator, and IntelliSense support. Let us see how we test the applications in both the versions of the emulator one by one.

Open Visual Studio 2010 and open any application which we developed with our earlier articles as shown in the screen below.

Let us consider that the SDK 7.1.1 is already installed and the application is developed, now first let us target the 512 MB ram emulator. We can see the option to select the 512MB ram at the top tool bar as highlighted in the screen below.

Once the Windows Phone Emulator – 512 MB option is selected we can able to test our application which will be targeting the 512 MB ram devices. Now simply run the application by pressing F5 and we can see the application opened in the emulator as shown in the screen below.

512 MB Ram Emulator

We can see Background tasks are available with the 512 MB ram Windows Phone Emulator with the same options available in the real devices as well. Now we can see in the 256 MB ram the background tasks are not available. To target the 256 Mb ram emulator, just change the emulator type in the top menu tool bar as shown in the screen previously. Once the the option is changed to 256 MB ram build and execute the project and we can see the expected outputs as shown in the screens below.

So in this tutorial we have seen how to change the Emulator settings which supports 512 MB ram devices as well on to the 256 MB ram devices with ease which in 256 MB ram the background processing is not supported.