Author Topic: How Much RAM? 4GB vs. 8GB vs. 16GB Performance - TechSpot (Read 33,745 times)

lanux128 · « **on:** August 20, 2015, 02:34 AM »

Is less memory better for your system? Techspot tries to find out.

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• http://www.techspot.com/article/1043-8gb-vs-16gb-ram/

mouser · « **Reply #1 on:** August 20, 2015, 11:57 AM »

Very nice find, thanks for sharing. Bottom line of the article seems to be that 8gb is the sweet spot and makes a real difference over 4gb, but that 16gb doesn't yield much of an advantage over 8.

MilesAhead · « **Reply #2 on:** August 20, 2015, 12:22 PM »

Quote from: mouser on August 20, 2015, 11:57 AM

Very nice find, thanks for sharing. Bottom line of the article seems to be that 8gb is the sweet spot and makes a real difference over 4gb, but that 16gb doesn't yield much of an advantage over 8.

The line from the article, paraphrased.. once you have enough ram to run your programs more doesn't increase performance.. makes me think those guys who like to have 64 windows open and Firefox with 24 tabs, will still find use for 16 GB.

tomos · « **Reply #3 on:** August 20, 2015, 12:55 PM »

Quote from: MilesAhead on August 20, 2015, 12:22 PM

... those guys who like to have 64 windows open and Firefox with 24 tabs, will still find use for 16 GB.

I generally manage with 8 GB ram, thank you

tomos · « **Reply #4 on:** August 20, 2015, 12:57 PM »

^ although I'm usually the other way round - more FF tabs than open windows

phitsc · « **Reply #5 on:** August 20, 2015, 03:10 PM »

Interestingly enough, I had Windows telling me I was running low on memory shortly after reading the above linked article. And indeed, when I checked about 90% of my 16GB were in use. Most of it were used by a web browser, Visual Studio running a compilation and a running virtual machine.

BGM · « **Reply #6 on:** August 20, 2015, 05:10 PM »

It's true!
My machine has 24 GB RAM. Once I reached 16GB there was no more performance improvement. But I am able to run a lot of things at once (like virtual machines, for example) without dragging the system down.

So aside from a better processor (I have an Intel i5-2500K) there are only a few ways to get more performance:
- overclocking (which is possible with my processor)
- switch to an SSD (not possible in my case to replace my 1TB with an SSD drive)

So there is a third option, however, that is inexpensive. I picked up a 160GB SSD drive. Then I enabled RAID in my bios. Then I set up Intel Rapid Storage Technology (IRST) that uses RAID for a certain kind of cache (not the Page File - this is different) - so it used half the SSD drive. Since I had the other half, I put the page file on the other half of the SSD.
This boosted my computer's performance by about 20% and the effect was immediately noticeable!
Sure, this will wear down the SSD over time, but I'm storing no data there - only temporary caches.
I also made sure to use a new high-end 160GB SSD drive.

Renegade · « **Reply #7 on:** August 21, 2015, 01:47 AM »

Quote from: BGM on August 20, 2015, 05:10 PM

But I am able to run a lot of things at once (like virtual machines, for example) without dragging the system down.

^ This.

BGM · « **Reply #8 on:** August 21, 2015, 02:08 AM »

Exactly. That's why I have 24GB!

Renegade · « **Reply #9 on:** August 21, 2015, 03:57 AM »

I don't even understand how anyone can possibly get away with 4 GB now. I'd go mad. I recently was borrowing a machine with 8 GB, and it drove me mad as I was always running out of memory. 16 GB seems to be about the minimum for daily use without running into problems. When 1 tab in a browser sucks up 1 GB of memory... cripes... And it's not unusual to see pages taking up 100's of MB of RAM.

40hz · « **Reply #10 on:** August 21, 2015, 12:43 PM »

Once performance is adequately addressed it's time to think about convenience. For the last 5 or so years I've made it my practice to almost always max out the installed RAM. With servers in a multiuser environment, it's definitely the way you want to go.

BGM · « **Reply #11 on:** August 21, 2015, 01:27 PM »

I provision a LOT of computers and my policy is to never release any machine with less than 6GB RAM. Of course more is better, but that is my bare minimumum. If I handle a computer with less, then I always upgrade if possible.

JavaJones · « **Reply #12 on:** August 21, 2015, 10:08 PM »

Having more RAM is actually mostly *not* about raw performance, although it obviously has an effect as you can see in those benchmarks. The problem with their testing is it was purely performance-oriented and thus was single-task, which of course is the most reliable way to get consistent benchmark results. It does not, however, address common and average use cases. It's only *really* valid if you're the kind of user who closes every application before you game, for example, and never does more than one thing at a time. Me? I have Chrome open with 38 tabs and I'm not going to close it just to play a game for an hour. I *might* close Lightroom or other applications, if I wasn't in the middle of something, but I have 32GB of RAM so I don't *have* to.

RAM is not at its cheapest point now, sure, but it's still pretty inexpensive and so I see little reason to recommend less than 16GB of RAM to *anyone*. You don't have to be a power user to benefit from it at some point, especially with ever-increasing complexity of web pages and all applications in general.

- Oshyan

kyrathaba · « **Reply #13 on:** August 21, 2015, 11:58 PM »

I'm running 6GB RAM on one of my Windows PCs, 8 GB on the other. Like BGM, I wouldn't go less than 6.

Curt · « **Reply #14 on:** August 21, 2015, 11:59 PM »

Forgive me for talking about things I don't understand.

Every time I explore my collections of music, videos and pictures, using Windows 10 Explorer, I will get disappointed with both Windows and my computer (4GB RAM) because of the ever so slow process of updating picture, video, audio, -thumbnails, icons and data.

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The slowness makes me dream about lots of extra memory sticks for my machine. It makes me imagine that I can add the picture thumbnails and icons and mp3 data into memory. Can I? Isn't the idea of RAMDisk programs (or eBoostr) that you can take some of your RAM and allocate it, say especially to icons and media files etcetera? How can I ever need only 4 GB RAM? I would expect 64GB to be much better... I know I certainly have a need for more RAM, when I explore my media collections!

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1) Dataram RAMDisk
RAMDisk creates a virtual RAM drive, or block of memory, which your computer treats as if it were a disk drive. By storing files and programs into memory, you can speed up internet load times and disk-to-disk.

2) eBoostr™, working as an alternative solution to ReadyBoost and SuperFetch technologies, implements a different advanced approach to use flash memory to speed up your computer.

Stoic Joker · « **Reply #15 on:** August 22, 2015, 03:52 AM »

Quote from: Curt on August 21, 2015, 11:59 PM

I will get disappointed with both Windows and my computer (4GB RAM) because of the ever so slow process of updating picture, video, audio, -thumbnails, icons and data.

That has much to do with the speed of you drives...and almost nothing to do with the amount of RAM you have installed.

In my new machine I've got 1 SSD, and 3 6Gbps HDDs in a RAID5 array ... Guess which one is faster..

Renegade · « **Reply #16 on:** August 22, 2015, 06:11 AM »

Quote from: JavaJones on August 21, 2015, 10:08 PM

You don't have to be a power user to benefit from it at some point, especially with ever-increasing complexity of web pages and all applications in general.

Good comments, but I think there you are being unnecessarily kind to web developers. They are some of the most arrogant, inconsiderate, and incompetent jackasses the world has ever known.

Just how in Hades does a web page get to soak up more than 1 GB of RAM?!?

It's insane.

Once upon a time, in a universe far, far away, web developers actually gave a shit about the computing power of their visitors' machines. Not so anymore.

I'm not saying, "Let's all go back to HTML 1.0" or anything of the sort. But if you need to take up 1 GB+ of RAM for your web page... you really need to have a good reason. And when I see 3 or 4 of those in Task Manager, I'm not really thinking that the web devs are particularly considerate of their visitors.

Rant over.

...or is it???...

40hz · « **Reply #17 on:** August 22, 2015, 12:27 PM »

Quote from: Stoic Joker on August 22, 2015, 03:52 AM

In my new machine I've got 1 SSD, and 3 6Gbps HDDs in a RAID5 array ... Guess which one is faster..

...and guess which one is significantly more expensive for the storage obtained - and which will likely need to be replaced sooner?

(Sorry. Couldn't resist - even though an SSD is a fine thing to add to a system.

)

Stoic Joker · « **Reply #18 on:** August 22, 2015, 11:31 PM »

Quote from: 40hz on August 22, 2015, 12:27 PM

Quote from: Stoic Joker on August 22, 2015, 03:52 AM
In my new machine I've got 1 SSD, and 3 6Gbps HDDs in a RAID5 array ... Guess which one is faster..

...and guess which one is significantly more expensive for the storage obtained - and which will likely need to be replaced sooner?

I know, I know ... You're preaching to the choir there man. But the Single HDD Z420 I have at the office is constantly lagging when I run several VMs because the drive usage is pinned to the ceiling. So I figured since the best Z440 base package I could find came with the SSD...I'd split this one up a bit and hedge my bets with the fallback RAID5 array. VMs and important files go on the RAID5, and the OS can have the 256GB SSD all to itself.

So far it seems to be working as I've currently got 2 Windows 7 VMs running both of which are doing 140+ updates and have the array at 100% ... Yet everything is still zippy and responsive.

Backup scheme pending completion of move.. (eek!)

40hz · « **Reply #19 on:** August 24, 2015, 05:02 PM »

Quote from: Stoic Joker on August 22, 2015, 11:31 PM

I know, I know ... You're preaching to the choir there man.

I know.

But ignore me. I'm mostly just jealous.