Gaming with 2GB RAM, 4 GB RAM

P.S.

laptop:

Sager (FL90)

intel dual core 2ghz

Nvidia 8600mGT 512MB

2 GB RAM

You will probably see an ok increase in frame rates. But higher resolutions are really based off of the graphics card. And with you having an 8600 in it you will be able to play at a higher resolution but you will have to turn down some of the graphics. But FYI if you upgrade to 4gb you will see an overall improvement of you windows OS.

RAM enables you to have fast access to larger amounts of data so it is more about being able to play on bigger maps/games without fps drop or running multiple programs at the same time (if your cpu allows it).

It'll speed up loading times because you'll be able to cache a lot more data without having to go to the hard drive. Especially in Vista, where a lot of RAM is used by the OS.

RAM will not help you play at higher resolutions.  It will improve loading times and frame rates at your current stable resolution, but jumping to the next higher resolution will cause frame rates to tank with or without more RAM.  RAM is important for gaming, but the CPU and video card have far more of an impact.

Thanks, you've been very helpful.

I think it's time for an upgrade.

Any place besides newegg.com to buy RAM at a good price? I waited till morning to buy some. Price went up $20. Bad luck.

Othello

ram is cheap if you have 64 bit you should use way more then 4 gb because 32 bit is limted to under 4.

If know know where I can get 8+ GB of laptop RAM for under $100 I will. Upgrading would only be to make my Dragon Age and Warhammer 40k: Dawn of War 2 gameplay smoother.

There is no reason whatsoever to have more than 4GB for gaming at the moment, regardless of your OS.  I sincerely doubt there are any current generation games that have been programmed to make use of more than that.

RAM also lets you have multiple programs open. If you want to have chrome, firefox, photoshop, Demigod, Vent, and Bit torrent open, 4GB of RAM will let you do it for the most part.

I've JUST needed to upgrade my memory. I'm running Windows 7 with 2 gigs ATM and I've never noticed a hickup. Hell, I played a game of DG while I forgot I had the new AVP open still and it ran just fine. Crashed when I closed it though, lmao.

But yeah, as long as you have a decent Proc, you dont need to go crazy and get 16 gigs like some people who I hate for having the money get.

The only game you need two graphics cards and 16 gigs of RAM for is Crysis. I swear, that game was made for computers in the future; only the top 5% of gaming laptops can run it at a decent, stable framerate on high settings. On low settings, I'd probably get like 20-25 FPS 

Crysis is a bad example for benchmarking because it's so poorly optimized.  NOTHING can run that game well on high settings, even overclocked triple-SLI configurations.  The highest settings on that game are there solely to make pretty screenshots, even if it's running at 5 FPS.

Othello,

That processor supports dual channel ram.  The ideal setup would be (2) sticks of 2 gigs.  If you plan on adding (2) more 1 gig sticks then the ram speeds will be decreased your latencies will increase and you will lose the dual channel component as well. 

Vista is quite the ram hog, i would recommend 4 gigs of ram and definitely only 2 sticks.  (i'm assuming your laptop has 4 ram slots, which may or may not be the case). 

anyways, good luck!

j

 

www.zipzoomfly.com tends to have good prices as well.

Google Chrome is a giant memory hog. It creates a new process for every tab O.o

Vista makes you run sooooo many SYSTEM processes, it's like 40 or some ridiculous number.

Thanks.

My laptop only has 2 slots for RAM. I was eyeing crucial or g.skill. 4GB total (2x2). Kingston's "value RAM" is more expensive tthen both.

Othello

That also buys you stability, something misbehaving in one tab can't bring down the other tabs except in truly exceptional circumstances.

Except for Flash plug-ins - those seem to just nuke the entire window when they crash.

lbgsloan, Crysis is quite well optimized. Even though it's slightly old now, it's still probably the most advanced game engine out there (mainly because Crytek the company really likes making engines, and they chose to target PC only).

By the way, your info is out of date. I have a single Radeon 5850 running it on all Enthusiast (1920x1200) at about 40 fps, which is very playable.

Hahaha, I find Crysis to be a terrific Benchmark for gaming machines, obviously its useless if you're after an Office Computer.  It's extremely well optimised, with 'Warhead' being even further optimised.  My one year old quad-core, 2gb DDR2 RAM, 8800GTX can run Crysis at maxium settings at 1440x900 resolution at an average of around 30 FPS, with dips into the low 20s for the last little bit of the game (for obvious reasons). I run it at the one under the 'Highest' setting, 'High' or 'Very High' not sure which one it is off the top of my head, and achieve a rock solid 40fps. I don't know who's building these Triple-SLI configurations, but you might want to take your business elsewhere.

Thread is slightly old, but:

There is not a Gaming rig I know of that can run Crisis with DX10, Ultra Details, at 2560x1600 with 4 or 8x AA and everything else turned on.

I have a 4ghz i7 930, 6gbs of RAM and 2 xfired 5870s, they can't even do it. Maybe 2 OCed 5970s, but at that point its not worth it.

Crisis wasn't designed to run at those settings, just for screenshots to be oogled over. Think about it, it was released back during the 8800 days, that was 3 generations ago and it still can't be maxed out. Crisis 2 will probably be that same

So do you guys think laptop RAM is on the way up in price? hold steady? going down?

It's pretty cheap right now if you ask me. Over time it will become cheaper, but not in the next month I don't think.

I'm holding off till about $50 for 4GB RAM (2X2GB). Dragon Age can wait. Probably by that time Dragon Age will be $15 including expansions and hence my awesome steam sale discount would be for naught.

2GB get's me through SoaSE, STALKER, DOW2, and should get me through Elemental. And all those GOG games.