X-Ray: Oodles of memory is all good, right? Kinda. The truth is, too much of it is probably going to waste. Here's how to fix that problem...
There's a lot of hoo-hah at the moment about memory, especially with the rise of 64-bit operating systems and Core i7 practically re-defining the base volume as 6GB. And certainly, as memory has come down in price and with memory vendors always wanting you to buy more, the theme at the moment is that when it comes to memory, more is always better.
Only that's not always the case.
Having memory in your system is not the same as it actually being put to use. For the most part, this is a function of the heritage of both operating systems and applications. You may be sitting on a beefy 6GB or more system, but a large chunk of it may never actually make a difference, and the money spent on it is wasted.
How do you know if your uber-gigs are working hard? That depends on how much you actually need, and this is first dependent on how much you can actually use.
Which is not as simple a statement as it sounds.
How much do you really use?Having a 6GB system is good for the e-peen stakes, but is nothing more than a hole in your wallet if you use little more than 2GB. And, for most people, this is often the case.
Clearly, the type of applications you run will determine how much memory is taken up as demanding programs like games and image and video editing can eat up lots, as does running many large applications at once. But this doesn't apply to most of us. And, more importantly, even if you do you may not realise that many of your programs are actually artificially limited to 2GB anyway, meaning much of your memory still isn't being used.
What about games? Even ball busting cutting-edge games can find it hard to push 2GB. And since when you play games these are usually the only main application you run, again that extra 4GB on your 6GB system isn't doing anything.
Part of the problem lies in how much memory is actually useable as opposed to how much you have installed. But, you say, I'm running a 64-bit OS so I am making best use of all my RAM! Well, actually, not entirely. The operating system is only one part of the equation - the applications you run determine how your memory is used, too (more on this below).
Finding how much you use isn't as simple as pulling up Task Manager to see, either - in fact if this is what you do to measure memory usage you're using the wrong tool. In addition to the memory programs use, there's also what the operating system uses and what's been assigned to cache - this latter is important, as the cache can grow as long as there is memory for it to expand, but beyond a certain point a large disk cache doesn't really do much for you. Meaning, if that's where much of your RAM is going, you'd probably have been better not getting that last 2GB module and just saving your dough.
At the moment 4GB will often do even for the most demanding games and programs (previous era Core 2 and similar systems), and 6GB (thanks to Core I7's three channels) is plenty for now. Any more than this, unless you happen to be working at WETA animating the next block buster movie, is probably going to waste on a home system.
If you want to see how much you're using and specifically how much individual programs suck up, grab System Internal's Process Explorer.
Issue: 107 | December, 2009