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Is there really any reason to have over 512mb of ram?

M

madman300

Senior member
I have been thinking about upgrading to 1.5 gigs of ram lately so I decided to see if it was needed.

I have been checking out my Peak Commit Charge and it is hard as hell for me to get it over 500megs. I have to have numerous instances of winamp (playing music) media player (playing a DVD) about 15 Internet explorers, AIM, Nero, etc etc running to get it over 500megs.

So my question is, is when do I need more than 512MB of ram? Is there any reason for me to have more? I really don't game much. Mostly I use my computer for internet, email, music, movies and as a general file server. However I will play HL2 or Doom3 from time to time.

My setup is currently

Dual Athlons 2600+
512MB ECC
300GB 16MB cache boot drive
800GB scratch drive (dual 400s)
Radeon Graphics cards
etc etc...

 
you ever play games like bf1942, doom3, ut2004, cmr04/05, eq2, hl2, etc?

If you dont play video games, then there probably isn't a need for it unless you like to run photoshop, flash mx, and a bunch of other programs all at once. it depends on what you want to use your system for. for day to day sh!t like what you said, 512mb of decently fast ram (ddr pc2100 and up) is probably more than adequate.
 
ok, all you gamers out there... how many of you have actually tested it out to see how much ram your system is using while playing these games? Peak? avg?

madison
 
Originally posted by: madman300
ok, all you gamers out there... how many of you have actually tested it out to see how much ram your system is using while playing these games? Peak? avg?

madison
Click to expand...

The only way you could not notice this is if you're a warezmonkey, and that 2x400GB setup is full of pr0n. 😉 😀 Everyone else I know with that kind of storage does DV/photo editing or heavy coding, all areas where 1GB is the starting point.

I suggest you move up to at least that. As far as game performance, you'll need to tell us what kind of video card you have ("Radeon" is not specific enough, we need model numbers) before we can tell you if you'll get more benefit from upgrading that first.

- M4H
 
You don't sound like the person who would really benefit much. Here are the proper questions to ask:

1) Do you notice a significant slowdown when playing HL2 and Doom3.
2) If so, does that slowdown bother you very much?
 
Originally posted by: madman300
ok, all you gamers out there... how many of you have actually tested it out to see how much ram your system is using while playing these games? Peak? avg?

madison
Click to expand...
I have seen it up to 750 meg playing farcry and doom3 (and this is before I started using F@H, another 105 meg)
 
farcry gives me a 750mb+ pf with 512mb, hl2 regularly goes over 500mb, and total war is a monster resource hog 2...

I noticed a much snappier Xp environment when i dropped an xtra 512mb in for a while (borrowed sadly 🙁 )
 
With windows 2000 while playing eq2, I've noticed my peak mem usage up to 1.65gb at some points. I do play at with high details and 1600x1200 though.
 
back in the day plaing soldier of fortune i went from 128 to 128+256 and it it cut my loading time to 1/3 of what it used to be.....
 
Originally posted by: biostud
Only gamers and people who work with huge amounts of data will benefit from more than 512mb
Click to expand...


If running Illustrator, PShop, Matlab, PowerPoint, Firefox, and TV is "huge amounts of data" then yes more than 512 benefits. 😉
 
Originally posted by: MercenaryForHire
Originally posted by: madman300
ok, all you gamers out there... how many of you have actually tested it out to see how much ram your system is using while playing these games? Peak? avg?

madison
Click to expand...

The only way you could not notice this is if you're a warezmonkey, and that 2x400GB setup is full of pr0n. 😉 😀 Everyone else I know with that kind of storage does DV/photo editing or heavy coding, all areas where 1GB is the starting point.

I suggest you move up to at least that. As far as game performance, you'll need to tell us what kind of video card you have ("Radeon" is not specific enough, we need model numbers) before we can tell you if you'll get more benefit from upgrading that first.

- M4H
Click to expand...

heh.. the two 400GB drives is for movie storage mostly... only a small 60gigs of pr0n...


Anyways, the only "video editing" i do is encoding different files to divx, hence the 2nd processor, however this application isn't very memory intensive.

And I am currently using a Radeon 9100. Basically, cause I could get one cheap after HL2 came out just to run it. Ill be upgrading that soon when I get around to it, but like I said, I am not really a gamer.

I think I will only worry about upgrading the ram if I can get a really good deal on it. I am just not convinced I am using over 512mbs too often, if ever.

madison


 
Originally posted by: madman300
Originally posted by: MercenaryForHire
Originally posted by: madman300
ok, all you gamers out there... how many of you have actually tested it out to see how much ram your system is using while playing these games? Peak? avg?

madison
Click to expand...

The only way you could not notice this is if you're a warezmonkey, and that 2x400GB setup is full of pr0n. 😉 😀 Everyone else I know with that kind of storage does DV/photo editing or heavy coding, all areas where 1GB is the starting point.

I suggest you move up to at least that. As far as game performance, you'll need to tell us what kind of video card you have ("Radeon" is not specific enough, we need model numbers) before we can tell you if you'll get more benefit from upgrading that first.

- M4H
Click to expand...

heh.. the two 400GB drives is for movie storage mostly... only a small 60gigs of pr0n...


Anyways, the only "video editing" i do is encoding different files to divx, hence the 2nd processor, however this application isn't very memory intensive.

And I am currently using a Radeon 9100. Basically, cause I could get one cheap after HL2 came out just to run it. Ill be upgrading that soon when I get around to it, but like I said, I am not really a gamer.

I think I will only worry about upgrading the ram if I can get a really good deal on it. I am just not convinced I am using over 512mbs too often, if ever.

madison
Click to expand...

If you're not gaming, you won't hit the wall nearly as hard or often. And with an R9100, you'll DEFINITELY get way more mileage out of a video card upgrade first.

- M4H
 
Originally posted by: madman300
can anyone give an example of what they were doing when there memory was over a gig... other then playing games...
Click to expand...

Adobe _____
Macromedia _____
MS Visual _____

Insert word of choice in the blank. Pretty much all of them love RAM. The more, the better.

- M4H
 
When I am CAD modeling with ADT2004 with some often very large files, heavily detailed, etc....I do the wirframe modeling in ADT but then youl link it to Viz renderer ( to set up animation, render, add lighting, cameras ,etc.) which launches that app...they both are open and I have about 200-300mb left of my 1gb....Throw in some other uses and it is less....Have a few drawings within ADT open and even more is gone...I could actually benefit with over 1gb now!!!
 
thanks.. now those are good uses. I just think it is funny how companies are trying to push 1gig in mainstream computers and how so many users are starting to think 1 gig is standard. I bet it is very rare that people actually take a look at how much their system is using.

madison
 
Originally posted by: madman300
ok, all you gamers out there... how many of you have actually tested it out to see how much ram your system is using while playing these games? Peak? avg?

madison
Click to expand...

I have 1 gig of ram and the only game that I played that needed more that that was The Masquerade Bloodlines; that game hit a peak of 1.25gig of ram used.

doom3 bf1942 Hl2 all stayed under 1 gig but i guess the trend will just keep going up. get 1 gig for sure.
 
For instance I run 512 mb right now with my p4 2.4 and 6800 nu..load times on halflife 2 are very slow, and there is a lot of stalling. I'll usually check the peak commit charge after gaming and it can be has high as 800 or 900. Must mean the swap file is going crazy and contributing to slow load times. Though I'm building a pc right now for gaming and it's gonna have 1 gb ram. Can't wait til my psu, floppy, and cdrw/dvd combo show up on Monday - gonna sit in a warehouse all weekend. 🙁
 
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