With 64bit OS's you can obviusly use more RAM than with 32bit, but are you likely to see a difference?

The system came with 4GB as standard (and a 32bit OS:rolleyes:) but what is it worth adding more or not, and the sort of performance gains. The MB can go up to 8GB worth, but is this just pouring money down the drain or not?

I know with a lower end system with 1 -2GB then adding another gig or so can make the world of difference, but will it get to a point where it becomes pointless?

Thanks for any input,

Joe

Extra RAM is always worth in IMHO.

The difference can be quite noticeable when you have several applications on the go at the same time.

PS. I've got a scratch built Windows Vista x64 system upstairs & it has 4Gb of memory & it whizzes along quite nicely.

It comes down to what you're using the system for really as to whether you'll see a benefit. In very simplistic terms, RAM is quick and disc is slow, so the more stuff you can keep in memory the faster it can be accessed and the better the performance of the box. If you can't fill up the RAM or your applications are not time-critical, then chances are you won't see a difference

One other advantage of lots of RAM is you can carve the box into multiple virtual machnes. My desktop at work has 16Gb of RAM and runs 4 fairly well specced VM's without breaking a sweat

Chris

For a typical home machine more than 4GB is IMHO pointless.

If you were to add more than 4GB RAM you would need to turn on PAE, which marginally slows RAM access or use a 64bit OS.

All a lot of effort for minimal gain.

Cheers all.

Personally I have no need for more RAM as I don't use all of what I have under a 32bit OS anyway.

I was just wondering if the premium the PC's with the extra RAM was worth it or not, but it seems that for general use the consenus is no.

Will wait and see if installing 64bit 7 makes it any better for the extra GB or so, although I guess it's not a fair test as it's two totally different OS's.

Well 64-bit is the way to go, MS are stating that their next OS's will be 64 & 128-bit respectively.

Yeah, I have a copy of 64bit 7 waiting to install once I have backed all the data up.

128bit could be interesting.

I always thought that 32bit vista/XP could only run/recognise max 3gb RAM?

I always thought that 32bit vista/XP could only run/recognise max 3gb RAM?

Its 4gb... but after various system shadowing (gfx/bios etc) its prob around 3.25/3.5gb

Have a read of THIS article which has some interesting tests on various amounts of memory

Well 64-bit is the way to go, MS are stating that their next OS's will be 64 & 128-bit respectively.

128bit OS pull the other one.

There are no 128bit processors even on the roadmaps for x86 never mind in production. As such (and IMHO) there is no way anybody is going to be creating the next OS in 64 and 128bit.

32/64bit represents the wordlength of the processor and as such the size of certain things. 64bits to represent the memory space means a greater amount of memory can be addressed that if only 32bits were available to map the addresses.

I always thought that 32bit vista/XP could only run/recognise max 3gb RAM?

It's 4GB, minus the memory mapped addresses for various PCI cards, devices and CPU accessible memory spaces on them.

If you turn on PAE, you basically get 36bit addressing and so can go past 4GB if the operating system allows.

IIRC XP and vista keep you at 4GB with PAE on, but allow you to have all 4GB.

Edited 21 October, 200916 yr by cheezemonkhai

4GB or 3GB or whatever with a 32bit OS should be sufficient for normal usage.

Since playing around with photoshop, my 6GB (on 64bit OS) are no longer enough when it gets serious

But then again, 640k should be enough for anyone

If you are going to use memory intensive applications go for more than 4GB of RAM and a 64 biit operating system; either Vista or Windows 7 (Windows XP 64 bit had a lack of driver support). Otherwise 4GB of RAM is more than enough for day to day usage.

I've got 4 x 1gb DDR3 ram sticks but they're only 1033mhz.. I'm unsure if that is better or worse than faster DDR2 ram (especially considering I could have got that in 2 x 2gb sticks)

Depends on what you're doing.

DDR2 and DDR3 have different latancy characteristics and IIRC DDR3 had a much higher initial latancy.

4*1GB DDR3 isn't worth the effort over DDR2 in most cases as there are other bottle necks that negate the difference.

Obviously if you want every last ounce of speed then you'd get the fasted DDR3 in the world at great expense.

It's the law of diminishing returns.

Going from 1-2Gb you'd notice a big difference

2-4Gb a bit better

4+ less and less unless you use a lot of programs that specifically work better with a pile of RAM.

4Gb will probably be fine for the lifetime of a normal PC doing normal tasks.

You'll see more benefit and performance from having a clean system that isn't cluttered with lots of useless applications that want to run on start up.

I always thought that 32bit vista/XP could only run/recognise max 3gb RAM?

Windows XP (32 bit) will only report 3gb of ram when more than this is installed - my work PC does this, it has 4 but only says 3 in system properties.

Windows XP (32 bit) will only report 3gb of ram when more than this is installed - my work PC does this, it has 4 but only says 3 in system properties.

My laptop (XP32) reports 3.5GB.

As I said before it's all down to addressing, location of the memory mappings and other factors.

The biggest thing with using all of the memory above 4GB is that any driver where 32bit numbers are used for addressing will hit problems when you try and go past an address in that range (eg 4.5GB).

It's just one of those things and if you have 4GB I wouldn't waste money going for more until you notice you need it. Chances are it will be new PC time around the same time.