RAM for gaming

[runzwithsizorz]

How much RAM do I need for upcoming games at 1080p? Have 8 gig now. Is 16g advisable? Or is 8g still ok

The Wife

 

[Elixer]

8 GB is fine for 99% of the games out there.

 

[HitAnyKey]

I think 16 GB is the way to go. 8 GB should be fine if your on a budget or certain the games your planning don't need anymore.

Don't forget that Windows can be a little hungry for RAM, especially when you keep your browser windows open while gaming. Plus some people (me included) like to watch Youtube, Twitch or Netflix while they game. Multitasking

I have enjoyed having 16 GB the last 3 years. Served me well. If I ever get another rig, it will have 32 GB for sure.

 

[sweenish]

I think 16 will be the new standard going forward. While still going for at LEAST 4 GB on the GPU itself.

 

[Stg-Flame]

You don't need more than 8GB at the moment. I'd say somewhere in Q3 or Q4 of 2017, 8GB will be on the minimal side, but for now, there's no need for 16GB or higher if all you're doing is gaming.

 

[nurturedhate]

If you are still on dd3 and have your system built with 8 atm you are fine. If building new today I'd go 16.

 

[shortylickens]

I've got 16 gigs. Can run Bioshock Infinite, Far Cry 4, Metro Redux, and Fallout 4 with several gigabytes of improved texture mods. No issues.

I havent played any of the new COD's, BF's, or Splinter Cells.

 

[ImpulsE69]

I do the same with 8gb, no issues on anything. I've never maxed memory. Video memory is much more important to gaming right now.

 

[Tweak155]

We're getting close to that transition point. If you're not sitting on DD4 yet, might as well wait as you may upgrade anyway.

 

[nerp]

8 is OK. 16 is ideal. I play Cities Skylines and with tons of mods and assets, my biggest city uses 14gb RAM once loaded. One of the few games that will actually use it.

 

[Midwayman]

Its pretty cheap to goto 16gb anyways. Not 100% needed, but if money isn't super tight I'd recommend it for a gaming system. If you're buying now at least make sure you get a 4 slot board and get 2x4gb dimms so you can upgrade later.

 

[WhiteNoise]

I think 8 is the standard but I prefer 16 myself if gaming on windows 10. I run 32GB DDR4 in my main gaming rig.

 

[sweenish]

You don't need more than 8GB at the moment. I'd say somewhere in Q3 or Q4 of 2017, 8GB will be on the minimal side, but for now, there's no need for 16GB or higher if all you're doing is gaming.

Arkham Knight already disagrees with you. As do most new releases these days.

 

[Sabrewings]

I have a few games that push over the 16GB mark pretty regularly. Although, it should be kept in mind that the way many engines work, if they see the available RAM they'll use it rather than do some garbage collecting. The same games could just as easily run on an 8GB machine with the engine having to be a bit more proactive.

That being said, I'm quite happy I have 32GB.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

I will never understand the mentality of the forums. "Oh you are a gamer, and you are looking to upgrade your system? Well, you should really try to get this 8 thread CPU that costs over $300, it is the most futureproof. And you need at least this $200 vid card, but the $400 one would be the way to go. More futureproof. And I see you have $35-$50 worth of ram.... you're good."

Better to have it and not need it, than need it and not have it. If you have 8GB and only 2 slots on the board, you can still get by, for now. If building or filling empty slots do it. That extra ram is the cheapest futureproofing you can do right now.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

Agreed. Built mine with 2x8GB sticks with the intention on upgrading to 4x if the price ever dropped below $100, and sure enough it did so I scooped up another 16GB. Ram is *cheap*, it's okay to overkill that a little to keep you from having to think about it again for another 3-4 years.

 

[ImpulsE69]

I will never understand the mentality of the forums. "Oh you are a gamer, and you are looking to upgrade your system? Well, you should really try to get this 8 thread CPU that costs over $300, it is the most futureproof. And you need at least this $200 vid card, but the $400 one would be the way to go. More futureproof. And I see you have $35-$50 worth of ram.... you're good."

Better to have it and not need it, than need it and not have it. If you have 8GB and only 2 slots on the board, you can still get by, for now. If building or filling empty slots do it. That extra ram is the cheapest futureproofing you can do right now.

That's easy, because RAM sizing needs don't go up exponentially like video cards and motherboard changes. Most people never touch ram until the next time they upgrade their entire system, unless they run into memory issues..but..when was the last time that happened? I've had the same sticks of ram in my board since I built it...in 2012, and I've yet to run anything that can't run it. Just because it "can" use 16gb, doesn't mean it needs to or has much benefit. 95% of the time that 16 or 32gb goes wasted. They know most people have 4-8gb so they are ideally set to work at those loads with minimal issues. I've modded the hell out of Skyrim and other recent games, and RAM was the least of my worries. Keep in mind we are talking gaming here. Since most games are made to run within the contstraints of consoles, this makes it even less of an issue unless the game is a horrible port...which happens..but generally more RAM is still not the fix.

Basically, while RAM is cheap and if you are buying now, sure get 16GB or more, but there is money better spent elsewhere and at this point only in extreme cases would 8gb be an issue for some time.

 

[Stg-Flame]

I'd rather spend $40 on RAM that won't go unused instead of $80 and have it "just because it's nice to have". That's like buying two cars and only driving one while the other gets turned on once in a while to go pick up the mail from the end of the driveway and back.

8GB is sufficient for any game at the moment unless you're after 4K 60FPS on the most current games. The most recent games I've been able to max at 1440 were Fallout 4 and Witcher 3 and that was with 8GB of RAM.

 

[VirtualLarry]

That's easy, because RAM sizing needs don't go up exponentially like video cards and motherboard changes.

Except, don't most games "stage" their on-disk assets in system RAM (if nothing else, to cache and de-compress them)?

Thus, if your VRAM goes up by a factor of 2x (4GB to 8GB), then your system RAM should go up by 2x (8GB to 16GB).

Surely, if you can afford a $300 or more video card, you can afford $80-100 more for RAM.

 

[flexy]

I got 16GB now, but I feel like I wasted 8GB. On the other hand I wouldn't want to "save" on Ram, from all things.

 

[ImpulsE69]

Except, don't most games "stage" their on-disk assets in system RAM (if nothing else, to cache and de-compress them)?

Thus, if your VRAM goes up by a factor of 2x (4GB to 8GB), then your system RAM should go up by 2x (8GB to 16GB).

Surely, if you can afford a $300 or more video card, you can afford $80-100 more for RAM.

Some do, most still don't use more than 4-6GB on their own (minus OS, etc) and most just stream off disk. I'd rather spend that additional 50-100 on the video card myself. Way more bang for your buck in the end. This will be this way at least for the next 3-4 years in almost all cases.

 

[Sean Kyle]

16 is preferable but 8 is good enough for most if not all!

 

[Ranulf]

8gb is probably fine but if you're keeping your DDR3 based system for another 1-3 years, and as ram is fairly cheap, I'd say why not. I didn't really need 16gb of ram in 2011-12 but it hasn't hurt all these years later. Anything built today, build it with 16gb of ram, even good DD4 isn't that expensive now. Next year... prices could double (I had bad luck in the ddr2 era heh).

 

[sweenish]

8GB is sufficient for any game at the moment unless you're after 4K 60FPS on the most current games. The most recent games I've been able to max at 1440 were Fallout 4 and Witcher 3 and that was with 8GB of RAM.

AGAIN, Arkham Knight already shows you wrong, as do other, newer games. Recore, just about anything UWP actually. BF1 will love more RAM. And the list will only grow as time moves on.

And your car analogy doesn't fit at all. RAM gets used when it's available. Everyone's ignoring the OS, your other programs, etc. I think that the simple fact is that if you are building a gaming PC today, you should target 16 GB of RAM. 8GB was a handy point to hit thanks to the last console gen stagnating PC gaming performance for so long.

 

[nurturedhate]

AGAIN, Arkham Knight already shows you wrong, as do other, newer games. Recore, just about anything UWP actually. BF1 will love more RAM. And the list will only grow as time moves on.

And your car analogy doesn't fit at all. RAM gets used when it's available. Everyone's ignoring the OS, your other programs, etc. I think that the simple fact is that if you are building a gaming PC today, you should target 16 GB of RAM. 8GB was a handy point to hit thanks to the last console gen stagnating PC gaming performance for so long.

So does the recent Deus Ex and other recent DX12 titles. The simple fact that the question was asked shows we are at the tipping point in moving from one to the other. As I said earlier if you have 8 right now you are fine and if you are building today I'd suggest 16. If you are on a budget then 8 would be fine though. We repeat these conversations every couple of years. The people who are saying that 8 will be perfectly fine for the next several years are the same people who said 1gb vram and dual cores are great options a couple years ago.