How Important Is Memory?

[TrevsAudio]

No, not asking because I'm 75!

I've migrated everything to a lesser spec'd machine (details in my signature); mainly because the one I had was total overkill for my requirements, and the new has Win 11 which I much prefer. [I could sell the old one for a neat price and get a few more guitars. ] The old one has Razen 5 12 core and 32 gigs of RAM.

Now, I'm not a power user at all. I don't have banks of programs and samples, and very rarely record more than a dozen tracks. Just DI'd guitars, EZDrummer and Mixcraft's virtual instruments and plugins, mainly.

So out of curiosity, I ran my busiest project and found that memory was running at about 75%. Would that be cause for alarm? I do have two vacant RAM slots, so could upgrade. CPU was running at 25% and there is no glitching, so I'm not overly concerned.)

Opinions appreciated. thanks.

[ppayne]

No, not asking because I'm 75!

I've migrated everything to a lesser spec'd machine (details in my signature); mainly because the one I had was total overkill for my requirements, and the new has Win 11 which I much prefer. [I could sell the old one for a neat price and get a few more guitars. ] The old one has Razen 5 12 core and 32 gigs of RAM.

Now, I'm not a power user at all. I don't have banks of programs and samples, and very rarely record more than a dozen tracks. Just DI'd guitars, EZDrummer and Mixcraft's virtual instruments and plugins, mainly.

So out of curiosity, I ran my busiest project and found that memory was running at about 75%. Would that be cause for alarm? I do have two vacant RAM slots, so could upgrade. CPU was running at 25% and there is no glitching, so I'm not overly concerned.)

Opinions appreciated. thanks.

Hi Trevor,

I would say memory doesn't matter at all as long as you don't run out of it If you don't have a problem, I wouldn't do anything at first. You wouldn't have any of it at the moment.

But there is one thing I would keep in mind. If the operating system runs out of memory, Windows moves parts of the RAM to the hard drive. This means that if you start other applications in parallel, this could happen. Normally this is not a problem and the system remains stable.

If you use an SSD, this swapping process is actually quite fast and you hardly notice it. However, an SSD has a small problem. With an SSD you can only write a limited number of times. If an SSD is constantly being written to due to insufficient memory, then the SSD will be destroyed. From this perspective, I would say it's better to have enough RAM.

Some programs also react to high memory usage and load fewer samples into Ram or things like that. From this perspective, programs could potentially run worse.

In conjunction with Windows 11, 8 GB of RAM is the minimum. 16GB would be better.. But as I said, if you don't have any problems at the moment, why should you change anything?

Patrick

[TrevsAudio]

Thanks for the response, Patrick! Yeah, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

For the record, I only keep my current projects on the C (SSD) drive -about 10 at the moment. Once completed, I store them on an external SSD drive. So my C drive is only about 50% used.

[ppayne]

Thanks for the response, Patrick! Yeah, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

For the record, I only keep my current projects on the C (SSD) drive -about 10 at the moment. Once completed, I store them on an external SSD drive. So my C drive is only about 50% used.

Windows normally places the RAM on the c drive. Typically into a huge fixed size file called pagefile.sys. If your memory usage keeps reaching its limits, then Windows is writing to this area of ​​the SSD. This shouldn't happen permanently.

The problem has less to do with the free space on an SSD. The problem arises when the same location on an SSD is written hundreds of times. This causes blocks on the SSD to break. An SSD has a limited number of spare blocks for this. If there are no spare blocks left, the SSD is broken. There is no limit for reading from an SSD.

If the RAM is often full, then this is exactly what happens. It is often written to the same location on an SSD. Not such a good thing

[cactus-head]

Hi,

I kinda feel 16 gigs is a minimum today in a windows environment. On a fairly low spec computer I have 16 gigs, and I just get by. Partly because of the cpu itself but the memory gets taxed pretty quickly.

There are things beyond the program at hand you have to think about with windows memory management. Previous programs, settings, file folders etc that you've used or opened are written to a memory cache that will limit the availability of memory for "new stuff." While one's computer may have 8 gigs, 4 of that may already be cached on non-mixcraft related stuff. as the memory gets thin, it will swap or remove stuff from the cache but that can have an impact on performance.

if you do use a physical drive as part of a swap partition for memory, that just takes extra time as i it slower than ram. And if you ever did want to use a sample heavy VST like an orchestra or really good guitar emulator, the VST is going to need some reserved memory for itself - usually along the gigabyte plus level for good performance.

You can probably get by with 8 gigs, and if the cost of 16 gigs is prohibitive then maybe it makes sense. But if cost isn't an issue, I can't see why you would stick to 8 and in this day and age on a window 11 computer not have 16 gigs (if not 32 gigs).

[TrevsAudio]

Informative and helpful, as ever. Thanks Cactus.

[ppayne]

I think 16 GB would be my minimum. But if your system runs well for you and the memory is never used above your specified 75%, then it's of practically no use to you, unless your system is already in a swapping situation. I would use perfmon to check whether the system is using the page file. If yes, then add more memory.

If you want to do more with the system in future, as cactus says, and you want to load extensive sample instruments or edit videos in parallel, then you will definitely get performance problems. Including the defective SSD.

Ultimately, your wallet decides whether you want more room for improvement in the future or not. If money isn't an issue, just add 16 or, better yet, 32 GB RAM. Then you simply don't have to think about the memory usage anymore.

If you don't have any performance or swap problems and you don't plan on using more RAM with the system as described, then I don't see any reason to change anything. That would be my opinion.

[TrevsAudio]

Nice to know, thanks again Patrick.

[TrevsAudio]

Mmmm - another thought just struck me.

Since it's mainly a Win 10 vs Win 11 thing, could I not just swap out the two drives - Dell to Asus?

I've already checked and my version of Win 10 on the Asus will not accept a Win 11 upgrade.

[ppayne]

Mmmm - another thought just struck me.

Since it's mainly a Win 10 vs Win 11 thing, could I not just swap out the two drives - Dell to Asus?

I've already checked and my version of Win 10 on the Asus will not accept a Win 11 upgrade.

Whether you can install Win 11 depends on whether your system contains a chipset that supports Trusted Platform Module in version 2.0 (TPM 2.0). This is used in Windows 11 for some security features.

You can get around this, but it's not necessarily recommended.

[TrevsAudio]

Ah gotcha! No, the Asus doesn't support TPM - that's why it won't allow me to upgrade. I had it built using the drive from an older Dell computer that died.

I think I'll just keep both machines; using my favored lesser-spec'd one until it becomes a problem.

Thanks for the help and advice, guys. That's what makes this forum so great.

[Ray Cube]

I thought the whole point of self levelling on SSDs was that the same bits were not always written to.
Has anyone suffered an SSD failure yet?
I have a small Toshiba SSD of unknown origin that my son took out of a non working laptop and gave to me.
I use it as a project drive for both audio, photo, and video editing and it gets pounded every day.
I have used it for about five years now and I have no idea how old it is. It is showing as having 92% life left and it is a small drive so most of it gets written to most of the time. Projects are always getting taken off and put back again or replaced.
My backup drives are all either internal SATA drives or external SATA drives so when I need to use a project I transfer it to an SSD or M.2 drive. Mainly though it is the Toshiba.


I do think it wise to use another drive other than your operating system drive to work on projects but I don't personally worry about SSD lifespans.

Ray.

[ppayne]

Absolutely. For normal use, an SSD doesn't cause any problems. Normally you write something to the drive once when saving. In combination with the replacement blocks, an SSD lasts long enough. But if the system is constantly writing because the RAM is not enough, then things look completely different. This should be taken into account. Above all, you don't even notice that the system is constantly writing. Unfavorable

In addition, SSDs are not necessarily recommended as a backup medium. I still use SSDs as a backup mirrored via hot swap to have a backup time of 0 seconds. Works for me in normal operation too. However, I only write to the drives to a normal extent and not permanently as a replacement for Ram

So far I've only had one defective SSD in my old backup system up to now. However, this was completely filled up every day. With the hot swap strategy, this no longer happens because some different SSDs are mostly running in the raid.

[cactus-head]

Hi Trev,

I'm curious: had you considered swapping the memory? If the old computer had 32 gigs, the likely configuration is 2 sticks of 16 gigs.

If the memory is compatible with your new computer, you could swap it out completely or just put one 16 gig in the new computer and put the 8 gig in the old computer for example. You'd end up with 24 gigs in the old and 16 in the new. It would keep both computers "memory relevant" so to speak and you might save some money.

[TrevsAudio]

I'll have to look at that, thanks Cactus.

I was looking to get another 8 gig stick for the spare slot. Would they be compatible though? The 32 gig is an Asus and the 'new' comp is an older Dell.