Is 1 GB of RAM worth it?

[lecter]

In a couple of weeks I'd have the opportunity to get full current price value for my 512 MB and upgrade to 1GB. Now, I wonder if it's really worth it...I have a 2.53GHz P4 and an ASUS i845E mobo (so it's DDR266 max working speed). I do quite a bit of video editing these days, but of the light sort-just cutting, compressing, etc. Would these tasks greatly benefit from the added RAM? I don't game practically at all anymore, either. My current RAM consumption in Windows (systray programs and IE) is about 360MB. So, you guys that have 1GB already, is there a noticeable difference in the normal run of things?

[Technoid]

the Jump from 0.5gb to 1gb made a big diff when I was Authoring DVD's, can't say that I've noticed anything else but a lack of "swapfile usage hdd sounds"

If you need to know specifik about videoediting I refer to the Hermits in DV :P

[lecter]

Well, considering that there's a bunch of maniacs in my building who do DVD authoring all day long @ 1 Euro/DVD (blank disc included ), I see no real incentive to buy a DVD burner and start doing that myself. Hmm...so I guess I may put it off for awhile.

[VJ]

It did speed up my photoprocessing... I use Nikon RAW files (from a D100); the computer is a dual Xeon 2.4 GHz with 1GB registered ECC DDR (only type that works on my mainboard).
The ability to load a number of RAW files at once in memory makes my workflow a lot easier...


Jörg

[ZokesPro]

In most newer games having 1gb of RAM will most defenitely help, especially in UT2004 and probably even in Doom3. Mopre ram means less swapping to the hdd as Technoid pointed out,

IMO, the more ram the better. I know I want to upgrade to 1gb but I can't justify the expense at the moment.

[Drizzt]

lecter, everything is worth depending on how much it cost.

[Jammrock]

I say go for it! It won't hurt a damn thing. That and if you ever plan on upgrading to Longhorn ... you'll need it!

Okay, seriously, I've got 1 GB in my work desktop system. I'm running all sorts of server side crap (file share and web), plus email, ticketing systems, and some other stuff, and going to 1 GB helped a lot. But if you're the type of guy who doesn't do a lot of multitasking, doesn't have a lot of crap running ... 1 GB of RAM won't do much good.

But if the upgrade is cheap, I say go for it. You never know what fun stuff you may get yourself in to in the future.

Jammrock

[Brian R.]

The longer you put off buying ram, the cheaper it is. Buy only what you really need today.

[az]

Yeah, demand for RAM in China has dropped, prices will drop, too.

AZ

[lecter]

the upgrade wold run me about 90USD...for longhorn i will surely have a new computer, and yeah, i do multitask quite a lot.

[spadnos]

Originally posted by lecter
the upgrade wold run me about 90USD...for longhorn i will surely have a new computer, and yeah, i do multitask quite a lot.

For $90, you should definitely do it.

Remember - it's not that you need 1G of RAM for a speedup, it's that you need more than 512M.

I went from 512M to 1.5G a couple of years ago, and it was the best thing I could have done. I mostly do programming, but sometimes need to edit large-ish photos (~40M files, several at once). I've been using the same primary computer for 3.5 years, and I'm pretty sure that it's only lasted this long because of the extra memory.
(Athlon XP1800/266, KT133 MB)

- Steve

[ZokesPro]

Originally posted by lecter
the upgrade wold run me about 90USD...for longhorn i will surely have a new computer, and yeah, i do multitask quite a lot.

So buy the damn ram already!!!


(sorry, had to get that out of my system)

[GNEP]

When building a machine for myself I always "over-" specify the amount of RAM. Never regretted it yet.

[lecter]

Alrighty, two more weeks till I get the opportunity & cash, I'll go for it

[Technoid]

Originally posted by Brian R.
The longer you put off buying ram, the cheaper it is. Buy only what you really need today.

Untill that particular memory that fits in your computer goes out of mainstream, then it will become more expensive exponentially