Anyone else out there thats a gamer think theyre wrong about 32GB being plenty of ram?
Posted by Bellmeister@reddit | buildapc | View on Reddit | 65 comments
Basically Im upgrading my PCs ram and I already have 32GB in a neew build.
Please correct me if I am wrong experts...but here is what Im thinking.
Now, I understand system resources being used in the background very well.
And these guys who do FPS comparisons of CPUs and GPUs and Ram in games on YouTube...theyre all using a very clean machine with nothing running in the background.
But thats not realistic.
At leasat not for me.
Call me lazy if you want but I dont want to have to turn off all this sht everytime I wanna crank up a game.
Heres what I have running all the time when cranking a game up:
Playnite, Steam, Malwarebytes (Cos Defender misses some baddies), Proton VPN, FXSound (since Nahimic blew up), AMD Adrenaline, Smart Connect (its an app that connects my PC to my cell phone and takes forever to get back online so I want to leave it on) plus a windows app called File History which is like a backup program most people dont know is there. Its for when you just want to backup folders. I have mine backup anything new to my Media folder (movies and tv shows) and my Games folder and keep them on my 4TB WD Passport excternal. Works great but it is also running in the background I beleieve since its on a scheduler.
Ive seen games use over 16GB of ram just by itself and with all these other things running would 323GB still be plenty?
coatimundislover@reddit
If you’re already using 16 GB with just those apps, then something’s wrong. You might have a memory leak. I have a lot more in the background on 32GB and I don’t break 24 GB in most games.
Bellmeister@reddit (OP)
Right now with no game running my available ram is 22gb.
Games that use 15gb to 20gb doesnt leave you with much and systems slow down when you go over 90% usage. And that goes for ram and your c drive.
You know your system starts to slow once your C drive hits 50% capacity.
Our ram is similar in that you want there to be ample headroom.
coatimundislover@reddit
Your system shouldn’t slow down after 50% capacity if you have an SSD. Similarly, windows and decent software don’t really work like that nowadays. Windows caches regularly used stuff onto RAM when you’re idling. It pulls that off and puts a lot of things in efficiency mode after you go into high usage. You can’t just add the amount of ram a game uses plus your idle availability to get how much your PC needs.
Bellmeister@reddit (OP)
Well, I know it isnt a popular or well known thing to us regular Joes but data recovery companies and others in the space do talk about it and recommend some wild stuff and it depends on what kind of files you have a lot of.
Apparently you should have 40% to even 60% of free space on your c drive if you have a lot of music and video files.
coatimundislover@reddit
That doesn’t sound true.
Bellmeister@reddit (OP)
I know thats what I thought. They said specifically 40% free if you have lots of video files, 60% free if you have lots of music files.
And while SSDs can startr to slow down after 50% full...the minimum free space recommended is 25%.
Oh, something that might make this worth your while.
Because turning on the paging file means the sysem will be doing lots of writes to the C Drive, thats apparently not good and will shorten the life of our C drive SSD.
To lengthen its life, move the Page File to an HDD.
coatimundislover@reddit
No offense, but I don’t think these people are giving good advice. There might be marginal costs here, but underutilizing your hardware like this is just wasteful. Any decent nvme SSD is going to be fast enough that you don’t care. And it will last long enough that normal user caching behavior won’t cause issues. It’s not the same thing as being at 99% RAM and actively running programs from pagefile.
NotChillyEnough@reddit
Just look at your usage while gaming to make the best decision about the RAM quantity for your PC.
Even with a bunch of background tasks running, are you actually seeing ~30 GB of RAM used?
I would say it's very rare for me to see >16GB used when gaming, but I do also tend to be somewhat "clean" and not have much running besides my game.
I'd still think it's generally true that 16 GB is an acceptable bare-minimum for a budget build, and 32 GB is a healthy sweet spot for the overwhelming majority of gamers. Going up to 48 or 64 GB is probably a poor value for most gamers.
Bellmeister@reddit (OP)
Yes you are correct about not hitting 32GB of usage, but as we know...PCs overall performance can be greatly diminished when our C drive starts to get full.
If fact its begins a noticeable drop after hitting 50%.
I believe ram is similar in the sense that our system slows down if were hitting usage in the high 20s with 32gb of ram.
For numerous reasons. Like you want to have a good amount of headroom.
And I dont see 16GB as even being an acceptable minimum these days...unless it will be used stricltly for email, pictures, some YouTube.
NotChillyEnough@reddit
Is this belief backed by any benchmarks or comparison tests?
Hardware Unboxed has a fairly recent video testing RAM quantity, and found no discernible difference between 32 and 64. It's been a fairly repeatable result that if RAM quantity is insufficient, then there's substantial performance loss, but if the RAM quantity is sufficient, there's no advantage to having excess. See: countless RAM quantity benchmarks over the years.
fliesenschieber@reddit
Aren't unnecessary expenses the ones that usually bring joy to life? 😉
NotChillyEnough@reddit
Haha! True enough!
Bellmeister@reddit (OP)
Idk about benchmarks but if usage hits 80% Windows starts creating a much larger Page File, which decreases performance.
Some people want system ram to be double their usage as a rule.
Jimratcaious@reddit
I leave my normal browser/ excel/ music/ whatever open while gaming and 32 GBs has always been enough. Even if my system was getting close to filling all of it, windows is pretty good at getting RAM full of gaming stuff when it knows the game is filling the whole screen. I don’t foresee 32 GBs not being enough for my usage until my CPU is outdated tbh
Suspect4pe@reddit
Windows is pretty smart. When you're gaming and that browser, excel, and such are running but no longer are used they'll be sent two swap if needed so the game can get the RAM it needs. This isn't always ideal but it's normally not a problem either. I really doubt anybody is using more than 32GB of ram unless they've got way too much going on in their browser or something.
I do think 32GB is a comfortable level. I try to stay away from 16GB on almost everything, but that doesn't mean 16GB isn't enough for most users.
thebarnhouse@reddit
Its even less of an issue with modern SSD speeds. I remember having to wait a couple minutes if I alt tabbed out of oblivion.
Jimratcaious@reddit
Exactly. They’d need to be doing a lot in a browser on a second screen or something actively while also gaming, or running two AAA games at once. Anyone that actually needs more than 32 GBs knows who they are, and they aren’t needing it for gaming
NormalSteakDinner@reddit
<3 I never close any programs, anything I use stays open 24/7 😂No such thing as "freeing up RAM" around here.
fliesenschieber@reddit
I have 32 gigs in my current gaming rig since 2019. It's the minimum if you play modern games and don't like to close all the background programs like it's 1998 again. As RAM is cheap, I'd probably go for 48 or 64 when building a new machine today.
Bellmeister@reddit (OP)
Dude, help me with your opinion on a small quandry Im in.
So, here I was with the 32gb and thinking I needed more headroom so I looked on New Egg and G. Skill 16GB kits that are the same specs as what I have in there now are just $29.90 so I ordered that to give me 48GB right?
Theyre not even here yet but I noticed today the same ram but 32GB kit is just $53.
Thats my quandry.
I get it with the future proofing being smart but if people are not even convinced 32GB isnt enough...do I really need to send back the 16GB and order the 32GB? I already got the return packing slip to do that but I just thought sht....the extra 16gb to go to 64gb wont do me any good for a long time right?
fliesenschieber@reddit
Only ever use 2 ram sticks from a given pack of 2 for a gaming PC. You're trying to run 3*16?! That's going to ruin dual channel speed and on top of that also the overall clock speed. Instead, sell your old sticks on eBay and get a new set of 2 sticks.
Bellmeister@reddit (OP)
No. I have two 16gb modules in there now..32gb.
I ordered two 8gb modules to give me 48gb system ram.
I was asking if I should just stick with that plan or send the 16gb kit back and get a 32gb kit instead.
Im thinking it wont help me to do that cos I dont run anything too memory intensive except games.
Forward_Cheesecake72@reddit
I have 32gb ram ddr 5 playing on 5k2k with everything on with YouTube and plenty of random stuff at the back like anime fb reddit and etc. At best i could only reach 20gb of ram usage. So to me, i would say 32 gb are still plenty.
Bellmeister@reddit (OP)
Hmmm interesting. Well, some games do use anywhere from 15GB to 20GB by themselves so, apparently youre playing games that dont do that.
Hey whats it like having a 5k2k monitor? Is it noticeabely better than 4K?
And...Im using DDR 4. Maybe the DDR 5 is more efficient and 32GB will be fine.
Forward_Cheesecake72@reddit
Idk if it better or worse than 4k since I come from 1080p. What games were you playing that use that much ? Just roughly from my hazy memory genshin was using like 15gb , cyberpunk around 17gb and ghost of tsushima like 20gb.
Never heard that DDR5 being more efficient but that could be the case.
NormalSteakDinner@reddit
If you are saturating 323GB of RAM you are pretty intense bro :P
Jokes aside, if you want to be safe then buy two 32GB kits and install one, if you need more you already have it and if you find you don't need it then return it (don't open it if you don't have to of course). My system is using 24GB and I have 0 games open (I don't play games anymore so can't help with that) , the most memory intensive app is Firefox with 28 tabs @ 3.2G.
fliesenschieber@reddit
Not a good advice to get 4 sticks of RAM for a gaming PC. Stick with 2 sticks in any case for proper RAM clock speed. It's a well-known basic fact.
NormalSteakDinner@reddit
Sure, if you're an esporter and want top tier performance but your system will still be more than playable with 4 gigs of RAM. Thanks though.
SeafoodDuder@reddit
I personally think 16 GB of plenty, but if you're building a computer then most people go for 32 GB of RAM because the price difference is only like $40-$50, so people jump up to that next level to make sure they'll have enough for almost anything they want to do.
Outdatedm3m3s@reddit
16 is not “plenty” anymore. 32 gigs is becoming the new norm.
Neraxis@reddit
It's plenty for the average user and gamer unless you're the kind of person who wants 900 tabs open while gaming an the latest AAAs with the most inefficient software.
Comprehensive_Cap889@reddit
Me with discord, spotify, firefox tabs and streaming at the same time while gaming on ultra: Hello
fliesenschieber@reddit
Add to that steam launcher, epic launcher, battle net launcher, Google drive, GeForce experience, and a couple more icons in my systray that I don't even recall right now.
Flashy_Entertainer_9@reddit
I used to subscribe to this theory. Then I played Hogwarts Legacy. Yea… 16gb is definitely not enough for some AAA games if you want buttery smooth performance and Ultra settings at 2k or above.
Neraxis@reddit
Which is unfortunate but it's also an unoptimized piece of shite lol.
Fortunately RAM is cheap unless you're outside the US where every buck (equivalent) is worth a lot more.
Death_Pokman@reddit
RAM is cheap now everywhere
Neraxis@reddit
RAM is cheap relative but some people are making and breaking on low end PCs due to location and geopolitics. That games are increasingly inaccessible purely because of graphics requirements and inefficient OS' (windows, fuck microsoft) is an atrocity.
beirch@reddit
Hogwarts Legacy uses up 22GB by itself.
NormalSteakDinner@reddit
waves Hallo 😊
Opteron170@reddit
This no one should be building a computer in 2024 almost 2025 with 16GB's. 32GB has been the norm for awhile now and the difference in price is small.
I've been at 32GB since 2021 and when I upgrade to AM5 i'm planning on going up to 64GB.
_Rah@reddit
There are games with minimum requirement of more than 16GB. And they do take up that much RAM. 16 is not enough even if you close all your programs first.
iamstumpeded@reddit
16 GB is enough for nearly all gaming use cases, 32 GB will give you comfortable headroom except in very specific tasks, 64+ GB if you have money to spare and (if it's DDR5) you're okay with potentially not getting full speed.
Look in task manager. How much are your apps currently using? For me (with 32 GB on Win 11), Steam is 300 MB. Thunderbird is currently also at 300 MB, though I've seen it at 600 MB. Firefox has gone up to 1.2 GB, but is currently sitting at 500 MB. All of the tasks related to nVidia are barely over 100 MB. Everything else is sitting around 10 MB per task. I currently have almost 22 GB free, and I can't think of any game that would NEED more.
Worth noting is that your OS will cache data in RAM until it needs the memory for something else, so your usage might appear higher than it actually is. A restart will probably purge all of that.
Bellmeister@reddit (OP)
Right. Im sitting at 23.4gb free. But I have more running usially than I have right now.
I do exci out of stuff all the timer, I just like the ideas of not having to every single time i wasnna play a game.
Also, the system seems to prefer there to be more than just 4 or 5 gb headroom.
like when usage gets to the 27GB-28GB mark performance starts to degrade
Death_Pokman@reddit
1st of all I don't see some of those apps reason but whatever, let's assume you need all, I still don't think all those combined would make your RAM usage pass even the 10GB mark. Now when we talking about gaming, the 16 or the 22 in hogwarts (however that was patched later and I just replayed the game this summer and never saw RAM going above 20GB at 1440p max settings), is with windows with general tasks and apps using 4-5GB just on it's own, so even if we count that 22GB, we need to substract that -4GB (which we already counted in the 10GB mentioned above), which is 18GB, and add that to your overall 10GB usage, we end up with 28GB but this is an extremely rare case, I never saw anyone with over 27GB RAM usage and that was with playing at 4k max settings, having 10+ chrome tabs open, steam, epic, uplay, discord, youtube music playing, VPN, and screen recording program. So if you just game, then 32GB is plenty, given that your GPU has enough VRAM so your system doesn't need to use your RAM. For professional editing and simulating and stuff, it obviously won't be enough, but you never mentioned any of those.
Bellmeister@reddit (OP)
Ok well, this is why I asked the question here.
To get different takes. And that I have gotten.
Ive gotten ones like yours but Ive gotten just as many that say 32GB isnt optimal anymore and that 64GB is the way to go.
I'll add to that something you may be able to address but having your ram running in the high twenties can start to degrade performance if you have 32GB.
Like the system prefers there to be more headroom.
Ok_Seaworthiness6534@reddit
Im a gamer and graphic designer so 32gb is a must for me, but often in UE5 and such games ive noticed 20-16gb ram usage, so i dont think 32 is over expending in anyway
Bellmeister@reddit (OP)
Cool thanks.
I also think optimally we dont want usage to be so close to 100%.
I believe it slows the system down once youre usage is in the high 20s, if you have 32gb.
Kinda like our C Drive starts to slow everything down once we hit 50% or more capacity.
Thanks for your time.
Ok_Seaworthiness6534@reddit
exactly also much better to future proof :)
SpiritedTitle@reddit
You're right of course. If you have the extra go for 64GB or more. The only cost really is the cost and it's not even that expensive
coatimundislover@reddit
It’s like $70 more, no?
VersaceUpholstery@reddit
I mean for your specific use case, more RAM sounds better. So get more RAM.
I, the casual user and gamer who only has the basics in the background (discord, Spotify, a couple browser tabs), am perfect fine with 32gb. I’ve never seen it go beyond 70% usage, and I’m rarely past 60% usage
Bellmeister@reddit (OP)
You dont use Playnite? Steam isnt on when playing? Malwarebytes? AMD Adrenaline or Invidia software? You dont use an audio enhancement app like FXSound?
In your task manager how much ram shows as available right now?
VersaceUpholstery@reddit
No idea what playnite is. Steam is only on when I play a steam game. Malwatebytes is only on when I want to do a scan. GeForce experience is only up when I want to do a driver update or if I feel like recording my gameplay. No I don’t use anything to “enhance” audio.
Not at my computer so I can’t tell you that unfortunately
Lemosse422@reddit
You can play 99% of games with 16gb just fine, 32gb just gives you more comfort and breathing room and for a game like hogwsrts legacy it's useful
Bellmeister@reddit (OP)
Thanks
Pesebrero@reddit
Most users assume you have to go from 16 to 32 gb and ignore the fact that 24gb is also an option.
Bellmeister@reddit (OP)
Ha, I initially ordered a 16GB kit to add to my 32GB figuring 48gb would be fine but I just noticed that another 32GB kit is only $53. And thats for very good G. Skill ram.
AffectionateTaro9193@reddit
You could run your own benchmarks to get an answer that matches your usage.
Run an fps counter with all your normal stuff open and running in the background and then do the same with everything unnecessary closed. Compare across your 5 most commonly played games and there you go.
Bellmeister@reddit (OP)
Thanks great info.
Yellowtoblerone@reddit
I've used 16 to 64. For gaming 16 is already fine with islc. For most cases 32 is enough. There's no need to over think it. Plenty of smarter people have tested and told you what is good enough
PinchCactus@reddit
32 is the new 16, and if you're building a high end system 64 is the new standard. "In use" is a misleading ram metric imo.
_Rah@reddit
All this stuff will not affect ram too much. 32 is enough for this scenario.
However if you add 100 chrome tabs, you might struggle.
Add some VMs and you will struggle even harder.
I went 64GB for this reason and I frequently average about 50GB usage. I could probably do with less, but it seemed silly to buy a 16 core CPU and a high end GPU only to cheap out on RAM.
Technical-Swimmer-70@reddit
the only game ive seen that uses 30+ is star citizen. 32 is the sweet spot
kevin28115@reddit
32 is just enough now.
t-pat1991@reddit
Having 64gb, I can already exceed 32gb in use while in some select games, typically heavily modded or badly optimized ones, of which there are no shortage of these days.