Should I upgrade from 4GB RAM to 8?

*joeyc* · 11-06-2009, 07:54 AM

Last spring I pieced together a PC using the AMD 7750 Kuma, Asus M3A78-EM, and 4GB OCZ Reaper DDR2 240 Pin 1066 RAM. I bought 4GB to keep the price down, thinking I'd upgrade when needed.

For the most part, the system is snappy. I use Lightroom, PSE7, Lightzone and often have my Slingbox player running so I can watch TV while I work.

The major issue here is the escalating price of DDR2 RAM and the dwindling supply. I bought 4GB for $65 in the Spring. Now it's $110.

What should I do? Use it with 4GB because I won't see much gain bumping it to 8 or suck it up and pay the $110 because I will see performance gains and will make my PC 'relevant' for a longer amount of time.

bergmania · 11-06-2009, 08:10 AM

Quick answer..
If you have a 64 bit OS you will probably get a small improvement, if you are on 32 bit you will not..

*joeyc* · 11-06-2009, 08:11 AM

Good point as I didn't mention it... Win7 64.

*imtheguy* · 11-06-2009, 08:15 AM

What OS are you running?

if its a 32bit version of anything then forget the upgrade. Many old threads on that if you want to know more

if its a 64bit version then install a gadget/widget and see if your max physical memory usage is even exceeding 3gb. If so, upgrade. If not, do you plan to add or upgrade any memory hogging apps? If so, upgrade.

Thats my cut in a nutshell. Happy to answer specific questions once the OS and current memory usage is known.

flippedgazelle · 11-06-2009, 08:15 AM

Holy sh*t... I haven't kept up with consumer RAM prices the last month or 2 - I knew prices were going up, but that's quite a jump!

If you're happy with your system's snappiness, may as well stay at 4 GB. You could also scour Ebay or join a Tech community (Anandtech, HardOCP) and get some used RAM.

I'm assuming you're using Vista x64 or Win7 x64.

Edit: Newegg has 4gb for $89. Not as bad...

*imtheguy* · 11-06-2009, 08:16 AM

Originally Posted by joeyc

Good point as I didn't mention it... Win7 64.

damn it...i hate when i cant type out a question before the answer is posted

bergmania · 11-06-2009, 08:20 AM

Then if you have the money to spare .. sure.. It will help some..

*imtheguy* · 11-06-2009, 08:21 AM

I have 8gb and just moved from Vista64 to Win7-64. My physical memory usage only exceeded 4gb one time in the last year when i was makeing a panorama from 12 full size shots from the K20D. So far am using less RAM with Win7 than Vista but I was able to turn off the virtual disk (actually set it to 64kb for small dump purposes) under Vista and Win7 so less disk activity with 8gb even if only using 2gb.

*joeyc* · 11-06-2009, 08:26 AM

Thanks for the replies. I'm routinely using between 2-3 GBs for most functions. I am running two displays (IPS and a cheap flat panel) off the MB. Therefore, no video card and it's 'sharing' RAM. I don't see adding much in the way of aps as I can do 90% of what I need to with those three previously mentioned photography programs.

My biggest concern is that if future use of the computer requires more RAM, I might be stuck. I'd like to be able to use this configuration for the next 12-18 months before going to the next processor, etc.

flippedgazelle · 11-06-2009, 08:26 AM

Originally Posted by bergmania

Then if you have the money to spare .. sure.. It will help some..

If he has money to spare, I'd say dump the RAM, CPU & mobo and upgrade to a cheap quadcore with DDR3.

*Das Boot* · 11-06-2009, 12:22 PM

Why not get a video card? I got this one. It's not bad for $45 - a video card with a gig of ram...fanless. It can run 2 displays with one running H.264 1080p and not put much of a load on the CPU (around 20%) - with purevideo of course. It will free up some of that shared memory.

*pingflood* · 11-06-2009, 04:30 PM

Damn memory prices. I paid $39 for 4 gig six months ago.

*joeyc* · 11-06-2009, 05:18 PM

Originally Posted by pingflood

Damn memory prices. I paid $39 for 4 gig six months ago.

Now the DDR3 memory is more reasonable. I learned a lesson though... When you get a good price, buy all that you intend to buy. Technology changes too fast and old technology gets low in supply.

*joeyc* · 11-06-2009, 05:21 PM

Originally Posted by Das Boot

Why not get a video card? I got this one. It's not bad for $45 - a video card with a gig of ram...fanless. It can run 2 displays with one running H.264 1080p and not put much of a load on the CPU (around 20%) - with purevideo of course. It will free up some of that shared memory.

Not a bad idea. Although my MB can run two displays (one DVI and one VGA). Not sure, but I think I would see a bigger gain by $ with RAM.

lithos · 11-07-2009, 04:54 AM

You probably wouldn't need to buy that RAM if you got a graphics card. A few image editiing apps take advantage of the GPU as well.*

*On that note, I wonder what Adobe can do with the new DX11 gen cards? Mmmm, tesselation.