The number of open file descriptors on Windows is limited to a maximum of 2048, which may limit the ability to open a large number of tables simultaneously. This limit is due to the compatibility functions used to open files on Windows that use the POSIX compatibility layer.

This limitation will also cause problems if you try to set open_files_limit to a value greater than the 2048 file limit.

On Windows 32-bit platforms it is not possible to use more than 2GB of RAM within a single process, including MySQL. This is because the physical address limit on Windows 32-bit is 4GB and the default setting within Windows is to split the RAM between kernel (2GB) and user/applications (2GB).

You can increase this limit to 3GB by specifying the /3GB option in the boot.ini file. This changes the kernel/application memory split to 1GB and 3GB respectively. This boot option is available on Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, and Windows Server 2008.

To use more memory than this you will need to use a 64-bit version of Windows.

When using MyISAM tables, you cannot use aliases within Windows link to the data files on another volume and then link back to the main MySQL datadir location.

This facility is often used to move the data and index files to a RAID or other fast solution, while retaining the main .FRM files in the default data directory configured with the datadir option.

The timers within MySQL used on Windows are of a lower precision than the timers used on Linux.