Benefits of Upgrading RAM
We all have experienced slow computers at one time or another and wonder if we need to add memory. What is memory? People sometimes confuse memory or RAM for the amount of hard drive space they have. Memory is what makes the computer able to process information faster. The fact that you have more RAM doesn’t always mean your computer can process information faster. Most computers that you buy in today’s market will only come with one forth to one half of the maximum capacity of RAM. Your pc has to have just enough physical memory to perform at its optimum performance. Nowadays 1G-2G (1000 Mb) of RAM will be enough to run most applications in Windows XP, but if you use Windows Vista it will be better to have minimum 2G of RAM.
Sometimes you will hear: “The more RAM you have the faster your PC can process information”. This is not true at all, the slowness of a computer depends on many factors, most of them I described in the article – Troubleshooting a slow PC. Let’s say you have just enough memory 1G and you change it to 2G, your PC will not perform faster if you had enough memory before. There are other factors that can increase speed of moving data from or to a RAM. For example today we have so called Dual Channel Architecture that has two channels that support one or more memory sticks per channel. Today almost all motherboards come with Dual Channel Architecture. And instead of placing 2G into one slot in Dual Channel motherboard fill each memory slot with 1G of RAM, it will increase performance of a PC.
The real problem here is every time you do not have enough RAM the data will be allocated to a Hard Drive instead of RAM (physical memory) and this process takes MUCH longer as it needs constant access to a Hard Drive instead of RAM to retrieve or store data. Access (reading, writing, etc… from/to it) to a RAM is about 50 times faster than access to a Hard Disc. Now imagine the consequences of not having enough memory in your PC!
RAM is relatively cheap nowadays and if you wanted to upgrade you computer now would be a cost effective time to do so. Make sure that you pay attention to the type of RAM you buy as each computer has a certain type of memory it can accept. The type will be clearly written on the packaging of the RAM and inside your computer’s manual. You also can check it by using this tool – CPU-Z, it will tell you exactly what type of RAM your PC has. DDR for example has prolonged chips on it while DDR2 has square chips. Here are some examples of RAM for desktop PCs:
Make sure that it is fully inserted into the slots when you add some RAM sticks! Otherwise it can literally burn contacts on the stick itself. It is not fact that it will burn but It happens, be careful with it!
Again, upgrading is a cost effective way to make sure that you optimize your time on task with the computer. Make sure you have enough memory installed and if not, upgrading will alleviate the headache for PC slowness.
You are quite right. I remember doubling my memory in an old PC thinking it would speed it up but it hardly made a difference.
Then I got some decent spyware program, deleted a load of old stuff from my hard drive and that really made a difference! If only I’d done that first!