Is there really a need for 16gb RAM in a gaming system?

[PP Mguire]

If you need more than 4GB for games then you need to cut down on the background crap. Not even Skyrim uses more than 3GB of RAM even fully modded, I would know. The only reason I have 8GB of RAM is because it came with this machine and if it wasn't for that I would be rockin 4GB just fine. We wont see games require an upward of 4GB of system RAM until after the new consoles come out and DX11 starts really being utilized. These console ports don't really do anything.

 

[jomoreb]

well I guess it sounds better when selling a pc and you say it has 16gb ram..lol

 

[iFargle]

I think I hit around 80% usage when I had 8 running almost everything I normally run including an MC server and a game Now that I have 16 I barely see maybe 50% max... gives me room to breathe

 

[PP Mguire]

I'm downloading the latest 2k mods (few months out of date on mine) to overwrite what the Bethesda junk did again then upping uGrid to 9 and will check my RAM. I bet it's still under 3GB usage.

 

[iFargle]

IMO: Get as much RAM as you can. You'll never look back and say "dang, I wish I got 8 gigs instead of 16..."

 

[PP Mguire]

IMO: Get as much RAM as you can. You'll never look back and say "dang, I wish I got 8 gigs instead of 16..."

The typical gamer doesn't need 8GB though. For somebody who (like me) only uses his PC for games and internet never need more than 4GB unless (like you, and a few others) run a TON of things in the background. VMs, servers, FRAPS recording, ect ect. Hell, I ran 4GB with an SSD and no pagefile no probs.

 

[munkeyman]

There is no practical need for it. I have heard that auto cad simulations can take a lot of ram, and some vid editing

 

[tj_extreme]

The typical gamer doesn't need 8GB though. For somebody who (like me) only uses his PC for games and internet never need more than 4GB unless (like you, and a few others) run a TON of things in the background. VMs, servers, FRAPS recording, ect ect. Hell, I ran 4GB with an SSD and no pagefile no probs.

+1. I could play modded Skyrim on high with a crapton of stuff running in the background while I had 8gb, and I still only used around 6gb.

 

[PP Mguire]

When I play a game the only thing I have running in the background is Xfire. The only exception being BF3 which requires the browser and then I run music too but it's all still lower than 4GB of RAM. That's why I said the typical gamer. I got another 2GB of mods today I will be adding to Skyrim later and I will be doing a test to see how much RAM and VRAM the game takes with all the mods, ultra settings, uGrid to 9, and 8xAA/8xTAA forced.

 

[PP Mguire]

Double post time, giving those shots I promised. This is with vanilla (1.0) Skyrim, and about 3+GB worth of the highest res texture mods I could get without spending loads of time downloading on my net. As I was saying, not even Skyrim in its glory uses enough RAM to warrant needing more than 4-8GB of RAM in a gaming machine.

This is with the mods, all Ultra settings, uGrid at 9, forced 8xAA/8xTAA/16xAF/QAO.

Not using all 1.5GB of VRAM, and only using about 1.7GB of system RAM.