Extra RAM

Technology and Gaming Help and Support
#1

I got a question. I ordered 4gb extra memory for my pc recently.
I already have 4gb’s in it. However, this was a mistake when I ordered it cause it should have been six. There’s an i7 920 in it so it has triple channel.

I use my pc for a lot of different things:
-I’m a big multitasker, usually have several programs with several tabs or files open running at once.
-I’m obviously a gamer.
-I do graphic design and use the Adobe Suite very often
-I often make music in Fruity Loops.

Now my question is: Is it smarter to put 2gb’s extra in it and go for 6gb triple channel, or put it all in and go for 8gb dual channel? (I couldn’t order em separately, they only come in pairs.)

Any help’d be appreciated.

#2

8GB dual channel.
Triple channel gives little to no boost.

#3

It can help if your doing computer programming, or if you’re a graphic artist but other than that it’s useless.

#4

8GB, although i’m not sure if going from 6GB to 8GB is going to be noticeable.

#5

More ram never hurt anyone, so go for 8GB.

This is probably a dumb question, but are you using a 64 bit OS? Because if you’re not, then you won’t be able to use more than 4GBs of RAM anyway.

#6

Hehe, yeah I got 64 bit Windows 7 :slight_smile:

Alright, will be going for the 8gb then. Thanks guys.

#7

after your ram is installed go in advanced system properties and disable the paging file (advanced -> performance)

#8

Haven’t heard this before, any reason for disabling it? I also have 8GB’s, so just curious :3 I assume the reason is that with that much RAM the paging file isn’t needed?

#9

The paging file is your virtual memory (c:\pagefile.sys). When a program needs more memory than your physical ram it gets relocated in the pagefile (and your PC starts lagging) but with 8gb of ram the only time it could happen is when you have a memory leak (program crash) and you can simply terminate the program then.

#10

I have 4gbs, is it safe for me to disable that too? If not, what’s the best value for it?

#11

Thanks for the tip sersoft, I’ll make sure to do that.

#12

Better idea, rather than listen to those guys and getting 8GB RAM, download some extra RAM to 16GB here!

https://www.downloadmoreram.com/

#13

The only time a computer should ever use virtual memory is when you have less than 3 gigs of ram.
You should be fine, but if you honestly notice a difference, you can just reactivate the paging file.

#14

After doing a bit of reading, to be honest I wouldn’t fully disable it. Some programs require the paging file to be enabled, and even if you have so much RAM the paging file isn’t needed, whats the harm in keeping it active just in case it IS required?

Also Windows pre-allocates a certain amount of memory to the paging file just in case its needed, no paging file means its all pre-allocated to the RAM. This pre-allocated memory may not even be used so you’re using up large block of RAM making it unavailable to you when it would be sitting unused in the paging file:

Bottom line, it may make your machine boot faster but you’re just wasting RAM by turning it off :slight_smile:

#15

Exactly. :slight_smile:

#16

If you have the paging file disabled it doesn’t.

#17

This. You can never determine when an application (or Windows) will decide to page something. The most I ever do is limit the page file to some fraction of the RAM (i.e. if you have 6GB of RAM, I’ll set a 3GB page file (or rather, 3072)

#18

shun the non-believers

shuuuun

I disable the page file because I don’t have 2gb on my HDD to waste, and I haven’t encountered any problems so far.

#19

Shuuuuuunnnn :smiley: :smiley:

No, in that case it allocates it to the RAM, using up RAM that could be otherwise used. I said so in my post :wink:

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