Would adding more RAM to my current rig improve the speed and overall performance?

N

No Way

My specs are below. I currently do alot of unpacking anywhere between
50 to 100 50MB or 100MB RAR files and other compressed files at a time
and also perform alot of volume/archive recovery and repairs of the
said files using QuickPAR. Of course, I also download those files as
well using a binary newsclient.

I don't play too many games at all on my PC, nor watch too many DVDs
or videos on it. I do however, do alot of encoding, many HD content
files to WMV 9 codecs.

What I was wondering was, given what I mostly use my PC for and
currently having 2GB of RAM, would adding say 2GB more to it help much
with its tasks? What do you guys think? Thanks for your time and
courtesy.

CPU: Intel Core 2 DUO E6600 @ 2.40GHz
Memory: Kingston PC2-5300 CL5 2GB RAM
HDD: 2 Seagate 320GB 7200RPM 16MB SATA II as Primary and Secondary
Masters.
Motherboard: Asus P5B-VM
OS: WinXP Professional 5.1 Service Pack 2 (Build #2600)
Video: SyncMaster 225BW, SyncMaster CX223BW(Analog) on Intel(R) G965
Express Chipset Family
Sound: SoundMAX HD Audio
Connection: Realtek RTL8168/8111 PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet NIC @ 100.0
Mbps
DVD: Pioneer DVR-111
 
T

Trimble Bracegirdle

You have windows XP ...be aware your standard 32 Bit version of XP (as well
as VISTA)
can not use more than about 3 Gigs of RAM ...you MIGHT get 3.5 at best Gigs
by putting in 2 Gig More.
So put in just 1 Gig more .
Mouse
@@@
 
N

No Way

You have windows XP ...be aware your standard 32 Bit version of XP (as well
as VISTA)
can not use more than about 3 Gigs of RAM ...you MIGHT get 3.5 at best Gigs
by putting in 2 Gig More.
So put in just 1 Gig more .
Mouse
@@@
Click to expand...

Oh, ok. Thanks for the heads up. I didn't know that XP had a RAM
amount limitation so low. I thought the limit was at 4GB. Thanks.
 
N

No Way

Oh, another question I have is, given what I mostly use my computer
for, would it be better to choose "Programs" or "System cache" under
the "Memory Usage" section in Systems Properties -> Advanced ->
Performance Settings -> Advanced? Thanks.
 
M

Michael Hawes

No Way said:
Oh, another question I have is, given what I mostly use my computer
for, would it be better to choose "Programs" or "System cache" under
the "Memory Usage" section in Systems Properties -> Advanced ->
Performance Settings -> Advanced? Thanks.
Click to expand...
Open Task Manager, Performance Tab. Bottom left, Commit Charge, Peak
value. If it never goes over 2Gb you do not need more memory!
Mike.
 
N

No Way

Open Task Manager, Performance Tab. Bottom left, Commit Charge, Peak
value. If it never goes over 2Gb you do not need more memory!
Mike.
Click to expand...

I've been keeping an eye on the Peak value under Commit Charge and it
seems that it's fixed on 613532 and never changes at all, no matter
whether I'm using the computer to unrar 70 100MB RAR files, error
checking another set of 100MB RAR files using QuickPAR, and converting
an MKV file to WMV all at the same time or when I just simply have my
browser open.

Is this normal?
 
N

No Way

I've been keeping an eye on the Peak value under Commit Charge and it
seems that it's fixed on 613532 and never changes at all, no matter
whether I'm using the computer to unrar 70 100MB RAR files, error
checking another set of 100MB RAR files using QuickPAR, and converting
an MKV file to WMV all at the same time or when I just simply have my
browser open.

Is this normal?
Click to expand...

Sorry, it seems that when I reboot my computer and bring up the Task
Manager, the Peak value shows as being 182396, then after some using
the computer described above, the peak value goes to 613532. Thanks.
 
J

John Doe

I've been keeping an eye on the Peak value under Commit Charge and
it seems that it's fixed on 613532 and never changes at all, no
matter whether I'm using the computer to unrar 70 100MB RAR files,
error checking another set of 100MB RAR files using QuickPAR, and
converting an MKV file to WMV all at the same time or when I just
simply have my browser open.
Click to expand...

In Windows XP, Performance Monitor is the tool to determine RAM
usage. It's very configurable. You can use it for monitoring many
different system resources/statistics.

Start -- Control Panel -- Administrative Tools -- Performance --
System Monitor

That can be very useful especially if placed on a secondary monitor.

Good luck.
 
J

John Weiss

No Way said:
Sorry, it seems that when I reboot my computer and bring up the Task
Manager, the Peak value shows as being 182396, then after some using
the computer described above, the peak value goes to 613532. Thanks.
Click to expand...

If you do the same thing repeatedly, the RAM usage peak will be the same.

Using around 600 MB peak is probably "normal" under the circumstances. If
each RAR is 100 MB, peak RAM usage might be 300 MB for the unRAR process.
Then there's normal system overhead and your other running apps.

Commit Charge is total of physical RAM and pagefile usage. If your Physical
Memory usage doesn't approach the 2 GB you have, adding more won't likely
help.

I just found that my laptop with 512 MB was using almost all of that with
little "real" usage. When I increased the RAM to 1.5 GB, Physical Memory
usage went to around 600 MB with just overhead (including a distributed
computing app running as a service), browser, and e-mail running. The
system "feels" significantly faster.

Though your system might be able to use 4 GB between the 2 cores, I doubt
you are stressing it enough to require it.
 
N

No Way

If you do the same thing repeatedly, the RAM usage peak will be the same.

Using around 600 MB peak is probably "normal" under the circumstances. If
each RAR is 100 MB, peak RAM usage might be 300 MB for the unRAR process.
Then there's normal system overhead and your other running apps.

Commit Charge is total of physical RAM and pagefile usage. If your Physical
Memory usage doesn't approach the 2 GB you have, adding more won't likely
help.

I just found that my laptop with 512 MB was using almost all of that with
little "real" usage. When I increased the RAM to 1.5 GB, Physical Memory
usage went to around 600 MB with just overhead (including a distributed
computing app running as a service), browser, and e-mail running. The
system "feels" significantly faster.

Though your system might be able to use 4 GB between the 2 cores, I doubt
you are stressing it enough to require it.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I'm beginning to suspect that more and more as I'm keeping my
eye on the system usage stats. I think the reason my system does slow
down is my CPU's just not powerful enough.

The unRAR'ing and QuickPAR'ing processes are pure CPU cycle usage
tasks. Thanks again.
 
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