computer memory

12sndsgood

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How much memory are you guys running for editing. I have an alienware desktop that I piked up two or three years ago and it only had 3 gigs of memory in it. I kept the memory low at the time and upgraded other stuff knowing I would build the memory up later. it has 6 slots and currently 3- 1gig cards that most likely will go into a drawer. im trying to keep costs down because I dont have a ton of cash, well not that i want to spend. for around $65 bucks I can pick up an 8 gig card. and that would leave 5 slots to add 8 gig cards to down the line giving me 48 if i ever go that many before the computer dies. for 100 i could pick up 6 4 gig chips giving me 24 gigs. i'm thinking that would likely last me till the computer died, its got an i7 processor in it now. would 24 gigs be overkill for editing. or would mightroom and cs5 make good use of 24 gigs?

With 6 slots I have a lot of options what I can go with.
 
I'm certainly not a computer expert, but I think I read somewhere that for a computer and/or software to take advantage of more RAM, it has to be set up/designed for that. IIRC, it was something along the lines of 'the computer won't use more than 16GB anyway' But I might not be remembering that correctly.

I had been using an older computer with only 3 or 4 GB of RAM, and while it was slow at times, it worked well enough for photo editing. My newer machine has 8GB and is pretty fast for just about any photo edit tasks that I ask of it.

Now, if you're talking about video editing, that might be a lot more demanding.
 
That's one of those things i was wondering about to Mike. no need to buy 24 gigs now if my software is only able to handle half that. I havn't had to much issues with 3 gigs as far as editing goes till i did a wedding or two and had 1000 files i was going thru. and then my hard drive started maxing out. so have another external on the way giving me two externals and one internal so that will hopefully help out a bit as well.
 
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the slots on your motherboard may not be able to use 8GB each.

Your motherboard may not support that much.

no need to buy 24 gigs now if my software is only able to handle half that.

Part if is is how much ran will the OS and software use and the other part is how much ram the hardware will be able to read.


Sure you may have six slots but that does not mean that those slots will be able to fully handle 8 GB, it is vary possible that each slot will only read 4GB of ram. Even if you put a 8GB chip in it it will still only read 4GB of that ram.

Also some motherboards work better if your ram is in matching pairs.

Before you do anything you need to find out how much your motherboard will accept.
 
Like everything else, the answer is "it depends." How large are your files, how many do you like to have open at once, how much other software do you like to have running simultaneously, and how much of a delay is unacceptable to you? I have a 2 1/2 year old iMac with 4 GB, I have typically 70-150 MB files, usually no more than two open, a couple of other programs running, and I rarely see any delay and if I do it's only a second.
 
I am on a Mac Pro and when I had 2 gig I had crashes all the time. After upgrading to 16 gig I have no problems any more and can have many programs open at a time.
 
Computers that are 32-bit can only access 4 GB of RAM Memory.
32 bits: 11111111111111111111111111111111 = 4 GB

A 64-bit computer is needed to access more than 4 GB of RAM.
 
its a 64 bit setup and believe it can handle 64 gigs of ram maxed out. i picked up 3 4 gig chips and that seems to be doing fine. figure im 4x what i did have and can add another 12 gigs later on if need be. thanks everyone.
 
I am using window 7 with 2 GB RAM and my photoshop is quite slow so I am thinking of adding additional 2 GB RAM in another slot.
 
iMac - 16 GB Ram
Mac Mini - 8 GB Ram
Macbook (2006) - 2GB Ram

I do most of my basic editing on my Macbook on the go, however if I'm doing any photoshop work I will use my MacMini and if i'm doing HDR/Panoramic work I will be working on the iMac.

I don't know what its like for PC's but I certainly have no real problems running CS5/Lightroom/Chrome/Itunes/Mail on my iMac with 16GB.
 

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