Right because the 350 MB that 7 is using on my laptop right now is soooo much memory 
Is that
just Windows or is that the total memory usage for everything on your laptop?
I still think he'd see an increase in speed by trying out a lightweight linux distro, especially compared to an XP installation that is who knows how old. If he had the install disc, a fresh install of XP would probably show some significant speed boosts as well.
