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PC hardware: Why all the hype for installing lots of RAM?
- 10/30/09 3:38 PM
Gigs
by thelastknight - 11/7/09 4:45 PM In reply to: do you mean sticks or gigs? by wasyedyeah i meant gigs, i was thinking of one gig sticks, srry for the confusion
no problem
by wasyed - 11/8/09 9:18 AM In reply to: Gigs by thelastknightno its ok I wasn't confused I was just pulling your leg a little 
I'll tell you why.
by Notech4u - 10/29/09 10:24 AM In reply to: Why all the hype for installing lots of RAM? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Many ram monitors just focus on the ram being used by the OS like Windows Vista or 7. If yours is showing you the total usage then the amount of ram used is low because you have a processor fast enough for system and program processes not to get backed up in idle stored on the ram. You still want a lot of ram though because when your hard drives buffer is full and you are saving deleting or moving a large file the excess gets thrown over to the ram. If your ram was to be full or at 100% usage at the time the file might be corrupted miss placed or even deleted.
Edit your startup and recovery settings to maximize your ram
by tek-ed - 10/30/09 5:01 PM In reply to: Why all the hype for installing lots of RAM? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Another thing you can do to maximize you RAM usage...
If you have 4gb or more of ram in your computer, the OS will reserve 3/4 of a gig for OS related stuff it needs to do in the background. But you can force the OS to release some of that RAM...
click on <start> right-click on My Computer and select properties. Click on the Advanced tab and under the startup and REcovery section, click on the Settings button.In the System Startup section, click the Edit button next to the "To edit the startup options file manually, click Edit"
Under the section labled [operating systems] you will want to add the /3GB switch to the line that is there. Additionally, if you run any applications that are PAE aware (Photoshop is one of them) then that application can partition the memory above 4GB for it's use.
For that you need to add the /PAE switch to that line above.
Here is what I have on my computer...I have 12GB ram on my computer...but it is a server so it actually uses all the RAM...
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Windows Server 2003, Standard" /PAE /3GB /fastdetect /NoExecute=OptOut
Ed
web/gadget guru
The hype is correct
by maartsen - 10/30/09 5:25 PM In reply to: Why all the hype for installing lots of RAM? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
The reason you are not seeing a lot of RAM usage is that your RAM monitors don't monitor what they should. As others observe here, RAM under Windows is a complicated affair - Windows has a decent tool built in to observe usage, but even that cannot tell you how the RAM is distributed between applications and processor cores. That is not something you should worry about if you're not a software developer.
I would remove those monitors - they consume a lot of RAM and quite a few CPU cycles, as many monitor applications do. When you run low on memory, the OS will tell you, but as it swaps to disk, that is not likely to happen. When the swapping gets to the point that your disk light is on more than off, and the machine slows down, you may have a memory problem, and at that point you can run some diagnostics, and figure out whether you're running a badly behaved app, or too many processes, or need to progress to a 64 bit operating system. Don't otherwise worry about it, and I would recommend not to run too many monitors, so you won't have to ask questions about problems that don't exist, and in some cases are caused by the monitoring software itself.
I can only otherwise second some comments I've seen here: 4 megabytes (3.2 addressable) is not a huge amount of memory for today's software, which is why you see more and more laptops and desktops with 64 bit architecture, some of which now come with a 64 bit OS, like most VAIOS systems.
No one really answers this question
by john3347 - 10/30/09 5:50 PM In reply to: Why all the hype for installing lots of RAM? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Why does a property owner have to put up more Christmas Lights than their neighbor? Why does a typical computer owner who stores 25 to 50 GB worth of information need a 1.5 TB harddrive? The truthful answer to these questions is the same as the answer to why someone needs ridiculous amounts of RAM. We as a consumer society are so wrapped up in the idea of keeping one step ahead of our neighbor and that if some is good, more must be better that we live in excess in everything. I will spare you a lot of technical details, but if you never "use" more than 1 GB Ram, you don't need more than 1 1/2 to 2 times that amount. You do need to keep some RAM free and have a bit more than you ever use, but huge amounts of unused RAM is simply wasted. Professionals who use programs such as Autocad in designing buildings and bridges, etc. for instance often have several very large files open at one time and may need 10 or 20 GB RAM, but ordinary home computer users and typical SMB users have no need for such amounts. It's all just that simple!!!
Ram Hype?
by jaytmoon - 10/30/09 7:24 PM In reply to: Why all the hype for installing lots of RAM? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Depending upon your software usage and installed OS you "could" squeak by with as little as 256 MB or ram (Win XPPro). However... do not plan on getting anything done quickly or efficiantly. I currently work for a municipality that uses (mostly) pentium 4 dells with 256 Mb of ddr ram. I was actually shocked by the installed hardware infrastructure and am contantly hearing complaints of poor performance, long waits for log-on's, rotten software response time and taxpayer dollars being wasted due to crummy pc hardware performance and employees waiting for the pc's to get the work done...
FYI, its a dell shop, but you can't blame them for poor system spec's.
Don't fool yourself into complacentcy, install as much ram as your system, pocketbook and OS will allow, you won't regret it!
Why ask only on PC ?
by hifly.liu - 10/30/09 8:53 PM In reply to: Why all the hype for installing lots of RAM? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
We always buy a lot more than we realy need. We buy Ferrari to drive in urban city road; we buy too many games than we can finished playing every of them; we buy more than one house for we realy need to live in; we buy too expensive sports machine to play all of its function; we buy too many MP3 players and now you just use the last one; we buy too many LV, Prada but you can carry only one at one time. So the question is not what you realy need, it depends on how much money your deposit on your bank accound.
Why oh why?
by pamelad - 10/30/09 10:36 PM In reply to: Why all the hype for installing lots of RAM? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
I wanted to max out my Dell running XP Pro from 2 to 4 GB of RAM. Diagnostics through the third-party vendor showed 4 GB max. I installed the new memory sticks and the computer is showing 3.25 GB in Control Panel --> System. Under Help --> Get Information, it only shows 3 GB. After reading through this thread, my OS will apparently only recognize 3.25 GB. I guess it's all fine and to be expected, but I'm curious about the discrepancies. Any clarifications will be appreciated.
Why do the cards take such force to install? I've installed additional memory in at least four computers from Dell and HP. In all of the computers, these delicate cards take so much force to install. Why? I can understand they need to be properly seated, but nothing short of brute force seems to work. Why can't there just be a gentle click of the clips for the sticks after precise alignment?
Jhampa, thank you for posting the question. BTW, my computer is noticeably faster with the additional RAM.
Ram and why enough is not enough.
by 28controls - 10/31/09 7:02 AM In reply to: Why oh why? by pameladIndeed, ram was expensive and Windows is still configured as it was! In the mean whyle, it has become cheep and extremely fast whyle hard disk are still relativly slow.
To explain why more ram is good, I need to explain how Windows is using it. Till now, all Windows versions configured the system to use only part of your computers ram as it never had enough before (due to it's price) so it used "virtual ram" which is located on your hard drive. This virtual ram, also called paged memory, is slooooow as it runs at harddisk speed. Now why would you allow Windows to use slow virtual ram if real fast ram is cheap? I don't!
So, I configure Windows to not use a pagefile at all which means all data needed to run an app are directly in the fast memory ready to use in stead of on the harddisk.
Putting the setting is somewhat tricky but lets not overshout it either.
If you have 4 or more GB of memory, Right click on "my computer", and shoose "properties", when you run Vista or 7, click on "Advanced system settings", then for all versions, "Advanced", Performance -> "Settings", "virtual memory", "Change". Deselect "Automatically manage paging file" then select "NO PAGING FILE".
See how your system runs faster and uses more of the ram you bought.
The downside: when you reach the maximum capacity of your memory, your system might hang. If you encounter that with 4GB or +, you rock!
Good luck and goodbye!
Marc.
Why RAM sometime is hard to install
by Walter L. Johnson - 11/2/09 1:38 AM In reply to: Why oh why? by pameladRAM should not be too hard to install as long as it is the right type of RAM. The RAM bus design is different for each kind of memory so that you can't install something grossly wrong. However, remember that most RAM is produced in places like Taiwan, China, or other parts of Asia, and it is sold as a commodity, just like peas and beans. So, it is unrealistic to expect perfect fits, and the memory can't be installed loosely or you may wind up with memory errors.
Be sure you always get parts out of the way that are there to hold the memory in place. Anything in the way will make memory hard to install. Engineers could design RAM sockets that made strong connections like the CPU socket which is locked down onto the CPU pins, but that would raise the price of the motherboard by a few cents, increase the size of the motherboard to provide room for a hold down lever, and require the cooperation of RAM manufacturers in a new RAM format. If the memory is not fully installed, the PC may not even recognize it is there.
Another reason why it is easiest to install RAM before the motherboard is installed in a computer case is that the motherboard may flex, which makes it harder to get the RAM card fully seated. What may be hard after the motherboard is installed, could have been easy with the motherboard resting on a non-static foam surface that kept the motherboard from flexing.
Other than that I would ask Dell technical support directly. Perhaps they are discouraging you from using RAM bought anywhere except from them. The test would be if memory ordered directly from Dell is easier to install.
A quote
by jave200372 - 10/30/09 10:50 PM In reply to: Why all the hype for installing lots of RAM? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
I remember a quote from a computer magazine here in Australia in the mid 1980s. The quote went something like this:
"RAM is like cash. The more you have of it, the better off you are."
Apt at the time and still so even today. :-D
A quote
by scleung - 10/30/09 11:06 PM In reply to: A quote by jave200372A great quote. RAM is like cash. Like cash, have more of it doesn't hurt, but it doesn't mean it will solve all of your problems. Yes, having more cash will give you more bragging right. That's what boys do until they grow up. LOL
Need for speed!
by admission47 - 10/31/09 3:08 AM In reply to: Why all the hype for installing lots of RAM? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
I have had lots of fun and "thrill" playing games or doing some typing programing on ZX Spectrum 8-bit personal home computer with 16 KB RAM but since then my "greed" for speed have increased as I wanted to do more and more fun on a PC.
Today I am not happy with 8 GB of ram as many other things changed since 1982 when ZX arrived in my room.
Internet can be a big RAM eater as someone mentioned earlier, graphics of any kind be it 3D rendering, Photoshop, Dreamweaver or Corel paint, web and or graphic design especially if you run all these at the same time ( as I do ) not to mention you like listening some streaming music and watch some football on DTV running over all your monitors ( in my case on 3 ), 8 GB of ram is just enough.
I am not super happy with my Phenom, two aging nVidias, "only" 1TB of HD space and ...
did I mention RAM ?
16 GB would probably give some boost to Windows 7 (64bit) to run all of its gadgets.
For now I will continue to over-clock everything that is "over-clockable".
Why?
Need for speed!
My time is precious and costly for my customers. To make all of us happy I need a faster computer.
If you are doing word processing and some light graphic/video/audio editing 3GB is heaps.
Some people walk, some ride bikes, other use public transport however I prefer a car, the fast one...
Uncertainty
by Alek.Liskov - 10/31/09 5:45 AM In reply to: Why all the hype for installing lots of RAM? by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
I see you are having trouble figuring out why your PC or laptop does not use all of its memory. First I want to tell you that you do want to use at least 30-35% of your memory, however try not to go overboard by using 80% and above for it could be harmful to the components. You said at time you get as low as 256 mb memory put in use, which makes me assume that you use either a Linux or Windows XP or below, simply because Vista is set up and unable to function if it doesn't have at least 1gb or ram. Trust me RAM is needed even though it is not always used to its full capacities. You always want to make sure you have that extra piece of mind in case something goes wrong e.g. your performance needed outreaches performance applied, so usage of RAM increases tremendously.
Another reason you might want to keep your memory at least 4gb is because a 64-bit Vista or 7 won't even agree to install on anything less. And I personally prefer a 64bit OS.
Hope it helps.
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