How much RAM is too much?
How much RAM is too much?
You're considering how much RAM to add for future needs. With 128GB total and 44GB in use, your idle usage is around 40GB. You're thinking about boosting to at least 64GB to handle more tabs or tasks. It's a good idea to plan ahead since RAM prices are reasonable. Let me know if you'd like more details!
There’s far more happening than just 40 Chrome tabs. I assumed Chrome handles background tabs well, but what else is running on your system?
RAM isn't about never using it—it's about making smart use. Extra memory is often kept in cache for quick access. For instance, if you jump between games to load new content, your old data stays in RAM, speeding up the process when you return. Over time, playing longer increases how often things are already there, reducing loading delays. I've been careless before, leaving many tabs open in Firefox and struggling with 32GB not being enough.
32 GB should suffice already. If extra space exists, it will be reserved as cache, potentially boosting speed, though it's probably a poor return on investment in terms of cost versus performance. Eventually, the benefits will be minimal. Of course, this really hinges on your intended usage if the system isn't running idle.
If your project really benefits from 128GB, then it's not a lot of memory. My main system holds 48GB, which is more than enough for most tasks—only when I join Ludum Dare competitions does it become necessary. With tools like Unity, Firefox, Blender, GIMP, Visual Studio, GitHub Desktop, OBS Studio, Discord, etc., my RAM demand stays under 32GB without issue. My R9 5900X will easily run above 50% utilization too. It might seem wasteful to plan for such high usage, but it’s worth it since it greatly enhances my experience. Navigating my PC during Ludum Dare feels just as smooth as any other day, which is impressive. When I first started, I had an i5 4440 with only 8GB RAM—Blender and Unity couldn’t run together. YouTube videos in a browser would load painfully slow, likely due to excessive disk I/O. Using a hard drive made things worse. If you regularly use anything requiring at least 128GB, then investing in that amount makes sense as long as it doesn’t strain your budget.
I usually consider it as needing twice what others claim is the ideal balance, since a little extra is better than just enough. It's hard to predict what new games will bring, but that makes more sense for a high-end PC. The main challenge with new builds is figuring out how far you can push with just two sticks and still hit the rated speed of the RAM. If you need to run slower to fit more RAM, you're likely losing more than you gain. For example, with Ryzen 7000 you can get 64GB or 96GB CL30 6000, but anything higher right now is tricky.
I'm a web developer who mainly uses this PC for Photoshop and coding. I often work on several projects daily, which means most files I need are accessed weekly by default. I also use Photoshop occasionally and play games. Right now my Task Manager shows: and sitting at a cool 44Gb. That said, I only have one project open at the moment (restarted my PC recently) and PhpStorm is at 3Gb.
The client is using a significant amount of memory because it's actively processing large data sets or running intensive operations. You're likely interacting with it in a way that triggers heavy computation or data handling, which naturally increases RAM usage. It's not unusual for such tasks to consume so much memory.