Re the need for more and more ram..... just look at what 'real' graphic proggies now ask for as a minimum. 'Revit' [think AutoCAD] wants 2gig ... so if you plan to use it...you'll need headroom [more than that].

AutoCAD was originally a Dos proggy..... back when 640k of ram was "no-one would ever need more than that".

Things change.

My upgrade was/is intended to be at least a little future-proof.....the MoBo can handle 24gig [6x4g] the system is thus intended for a 64bit OS [not used yet...hasn't been finally released - I'll buy it then].

Most computer components have working limits....where when exceeded will shorten their lives....heat being one of the main worries/causes .... so building in 'headroom' where, for examply my CPU is currently dribbling along at 1% and as is the mem use .... and the temps are 4/5ths of eff-all means the hardware will give a long service.

Think of it with the car analogy once more.... a Ferrari will do 100mph.....as will that VeeDub Beetle.  One will be close to its limits and likely end up a smoking wreck sooner than the other.....one is virtually idling in 5th gear....the other is red-lining with valve-bounce.

I've never ever used RAID ... but I am tempted to experiment as I have 2 identical drives that'd suit....and it's my HD score that has me at 5.9.

So what if I also load up a DosBox so I can use all this hardware to play TerraNova?  It was a great game in its time...

  I completely agree AND I also disable background services/processes which are not being used for my systems.   As time passes the average individual will continue to use more and more RAM, Harddrive space, CPU usage, etc., etc., .

Also correct...  +1 karma for providing a good response before my next visit on the forum.   

Yes and Office 97 runs quite smooth on a pentium 233 mhz too.. That doesn't help us much now. New times demand more data which demands more RAM to work with. Sure you could do with less, you can also clean your bathroom with a tooth brush. That doesn't mean it's productive. But if you prefer it that way, or don't fancy spending the money for better gear, then you won't hear me complain, more power to ya. But don't blame  Windows for it.

Because it is programmed more efficiently, has waaaay less legacy hardware support, and loads less services. But that was not the point.

You stated that we wouldn't need so much RAM if Windows would be programmed better. That is simply not true. I agree that Windows could do with less - it could be a much smoother and slicker OS overall if people didn't want their DOS applications and matrix printer to still work - but in the end it only uses a couple of hundred MB max when other applications need the RAM. A note here: RAM usage stats of the resource explorer does not tell you much. Since Vista applications can 'reservate' more RAM then they use, it's like "Hey I only use 25 MB but I'll just take 100 MB now in case I need it later. If you need it before I do you can have it back." Also, 'inactive' processes are moved to the pagefile. So all in all Windows doesn't use much.

Now, back to the same thing I already said before. The reason we 'need' more RAM, or why should want to, is that it makes our regular software, like games, run better and/or faster. A good example of this can be AutoCAD, Photoshop, or any MMO like World of Warcraft. Software like this says "Sweet, I'll just take up all available RAM because then I can do my work faster!" That means you can run the software with 512 MB RAM, but also with 4+GB of RAM. In the latter case it'll just run faster because it has to (re)load data less often. And isn't more speed what we all want?

I really don't see why you'd blame Windows for that? And more RAM equals better performance equals happy gamers. So what is the problem?

Sorry, just doesn't work that way. At some point the new will simply not be able to work with the old.

Who is forcing you? If you want to run Windows 3.11 on your equally old PC then go ahead? I'm not holding a gun to your head to upgrade. If you want to play the latest games, browse the internet etc.. yes then you should but then you want to upgrade, still nobody is forcing you. And if you are not satisfied about Windows' resource usage, then why not stick to Linux or OSX? No one forces you to run Windows at all.

Comparing Windows to OSX is pointless, the legacy argument flies again. An OS that has to support exponentional numbers of hardware will inevitably be heavier on resources. It's pretty much the people's own choice for it to be this way. If you don't understand why the comparison doesn't work, then please stop posting. At the moment you are making a fool out of yourself.

Okay gentlemen, lets shut this down.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/memory-module-upgrade,2264.html

Above is a link to an article where someone did the work to find out if adding excessive amounts of RAM was worth it.  It's simple.  In the same way that many games do not benefit from multip CPU's they do not benefit from extra RAM beyond a certain point.  On average most program would not utilize more than 2 gigs of RAM itself.  This set the benchmark at 3 gigs being a good starting point for RAM.  1 gig for general OS operations and a whole 2 gigs left for any running program to play with.  Just because your 64-Bit OS can address Several gigs of RAM does not mean your application/game will.  If an application was programmed in 32 bit then odds are good that 2 gigs of RAM are the max it will/can use.

Next up are the comments that with larger RAM more files will be cached.  Yes more will be cached, but let get serious for a minute.  Things get cached as data reads progress.  The computer does not cache files in advance, it will cache them after a request for them occurs leaving you with not much of a performance gain.  This coupled with the potential for a cached file to still be dropped causing another Page/Memory Fault to occur hampering your performance.

Face it, having RAM beyond a certain point does not a single thing for your performance.  Right now 6 gigs appears to be the sweet spot.

For those of you who have trashed SSD's.  You need to go back and look at the new drives before you keep running mouth.  Yes, many of the first SSD's were not worth it, but the new SSD from OCZ had turned heads, and it has the performance to back up it's claims and then some.  Only SERVER systems benefit from additional RAM because those systems are designed to take advantage of large RAM in ways a desktop OS/Application does not.  And even with that being said, even servers greatly benefit from SSD's.  The new SSD's resolve the problems old SSD's had.  Problems like stuttering and slow write speeds have been resolved with OCZ's Vertex SSD's.  There were even issues when people tried to use them as System drive, but OCZ's Vertex make EXCELLENT system drives.

I Personally own an SSD, HDD 7.2k, 320 SCSI 10k, and SAS 15k drives.  NOTHING touches that SSD in performance.  Additionally, I have personally watched a single SSD absolutely stomp the living dog mess out of even a 4x SAS RAID5 array in SQL Transactions.  Literally a program that took normally 4~5 hours to complete with just adding SSD's took only 30 minutes.  The database in question was 70gigs, and the server only had 8 gigs of RAM.

Just removing the latency alone is reason enough to get SSD, not to mention that the OCZ Vertex's consistently pipe over 200 Mb/s sustained transfer rates in read and 100 Mb/s in writing.  Standard HDD is lucky if it can sustain an average of 70Mb/s across the entire disk from outside to inside tracks.  Additionlly that HDD can only see that performance during linear writes and reads and this is rarely the case during normal operations.  During general operation the drive will be doing random read and writing across the drive.  And I have seen with my own eyes HDD's drop into the 5mb/s of thouroughput when it is reading from a drive in very random patterns.  An SSD will not lose performance just because of Random operations.  It will easly smoak any convention spinning disk in Random IO.

Any of you who called me a fanboy or overly excited about SSD's obviously do not know what you are talking about, or you have not tried the new generation of SSD's from OCZ.  Yes I am excited, but I am a Technology professional.  You have to prove your technology before I jump on board.

As I said in an earlier post.  HANDS DOWN SSD!  Especially if you are considering a RAM upgrade over an SSD purchase.  You will simply realize performance gains in your system that you have never seen before.

As a challenge, for those of you with a spinning disk, I want you restart your computer and try to open a program just as soon as you see your desktop appear.  Do not waint for the hour glass to go away, I want you to execute that program as fast as you can get your cursor over it and double-click.  You have to wait for a decent amount of time before you see it come to life don't you?  With my SSD I can run applications just as soon as I can click them when the desktop appears.

HDD's are the last bottlenecks in computers today.  The rate of growth for CPU's, GPU's, RAM, and Motherboards have far outstriped the technological growth of HDD's.  Now for the first time we are seeing significant advances in drive technology since HDD's were introduced.  The differences experienced in the old days when hard drives replaced floppy drives is back again with SSD's replacing HDD's.  Now don't get me wrong, the SSD does not fully replace the HDD in the storage department.  You can easily get a Terabyte of HDD storage for under $150, but if you are wanting to improve performance, then SSD is your friend.  The optimum configuration is, SSD for system and gaming, and HDD for your video, music, pictures, and long term storage.

For those of you who say its not worth the money, I can respect that. Many people will not buy until SSD hits a certain $/GB ratio, But don't say that in context with advocating a RAM upgrade, and especially if you are after performance.

If RAM is your next Upgrade just get yourself an OCZ Vertex instead.  You will not be disappointed!

Once upon a time 'someone' said no-one would ever NEED more than 640k.

6gig may be a 'sweet spot'....but that is NOW.  If you are planning on buying a new machine and intend to have it for 5 years or so....you better make sure you're not at the upper limits of potential specification.  To do so is both naive and short-sighted.....

    Finally someone saying what i wanted to say!! Instead of just crying its to expensive ... i know not everyone can afford but (above) is what i've been tryin to says.

This is what i do. I got the Intel 80GB SSD for my gaming PC and a network hard-drive of 500GB where i keep everything. I just stream files (like a movie or somethin) if need-be .

Actually his statement kinds of makes me /facepalm here.

Just because astral is the one that agrees with you Makerz doesn't mean he's the only one with a legit point.

Furthermore, the concept that sir astral suggested is quite common. Just about everyone with Raptor hard drives does it, and so do I. I actually have one Raptor just for the OS and one Raptor just for games, but that is more arbitrary than planned.

And "crying it's too expensive" ?? I'm sorry, I didn't know we were all in tears. Hand me a hanky will you? At the moment a 60GB OCZ will buy you 2 TB of 'normal' hard drive space. That's a big difference. Not that one is better than the other, but it all depends on what you use it for. If someone wants/needs 1TB of hard drive space they'll have to go with a normal hard drive, because getting the same GBs with SSD will cost in excess of $1000. Does that mean they are crying that SSDs are too expensive? They just buy what best suits their needs.

Also Jafo has a good point. If you buy new hardware now buying 1 or 2 GBs of RAM is silly. You'd be upgrading again in a year or two. That's not compensating, that's thinking ahead.

Sir astral made a good post with decent arguments. The benchmark he linked is actually quite intresting, I never knew they even benchmarked RAM amounts. I do however disagree with several things he said, but I'm getting tired of the discussion. Just get the frikking SSD if you want to, you're the one that uses your PC, not us. And if you want to upgrade your RAM, hussah don't let us stop you.

OH BTW ill comment on this ONE time to point it out for you.

You obviously didn't read what i quoted from him ... OR what i said .... or maybe ... JUST MAYBE you would of caught this ...

"You can easily get a Terabyte of HDD storage for under $150, but if you are wanting to improve performance, then SSD is your friend.  The optimum configuration is, SSD for system and gaming, and HDD for your video, music, pictures, and long term storage."

Hm.

Performance = SSD

Storage = YES A NORMAL HDD BECAUSE SPACE = LAWL CHEAP.

Jeez please read b 4 you try and jump down my throat. These forums srsly have just turned into someone saying something and another person jumping down their throat at the first chance they see to try and look bigger more-bad-ass or w/e.

Please READ befor you post.

I AGREE NOT EVERYONE CAN AFFORD A SSD.

SSD= PERFORMANCE                  HDD = STORAGE.

We didn't say "Lawl you don't have a SSD? My god just .. what are you thinking? No SSD? YOU CANT USE NORMAL HARDDRIVEZZZZZ"

I'd install a SSD in a heartbeat if it were not for the price and spiralling living expenses eating into limited funds. I'd love to equip my rig with a SSD drive, but with electricity costs set to rise $50 - $60 next quarter, I'm more worried about keeping the power on than getting a more efficient/faster drive

Besides, I've already used 84 gigs of my primary OS partition of 192gb, and as yet have still not installed all my apps/skins, so I'd need a 160gb SSD at minimum, and one of those in Oz averages anywhere between S1,115- $1,400, which is way, way out of my league.  At those prices I'd have to do a lot of going without and saving madly over 2 -3 years to get one.

Nope, don't me see getting one any time soon, but I can dream... jealously call those that do have them braggarts and boastful skites.

ssd's are fine and all if you really need them (like stated above), but what really craps my budget is gfx cards. they have a new one out twice a year and its only ever slightly better then the previous one (with some exceptions) in real world applications. and what they charge for a high end card is even worse, a profit i can understand but $300+ for a 'high-end' card that is almost beaten (again in real world application) by a lesser card or better yet, a previous generation card is sad.

just my $.02