Originally posted by: rod
I would pick Corsair, because Ive used Corsair before, but the Patriot is usually considered pretty good by anyone who's used it.
Why do you need 2GB? Even the newest games will run on 256MB, with 512MB the preffered option. I've seen benchmarks that show the difference between 512MB and 1024MB, and it's never more than 5%. Im sure that the difference between 1024MB and 2048MB would be even smaller... If you really want, get it, but your probably paying for something that will have no effect on performance.
RoD
Are you kidding!? Games run like absolute crap with 256mb. Windows XP consumes over 130MBs alone on a clean installation with no apps running, and that leaves squat for any modern game. Doom 3 requires at least 384 MBs, for instance; it runs decently with 1 GB, but could benefit from more RAM. 512mb is pushing it for games. 1gb is the minimum for most gamers, and UT2k4 and HL2 eat up every last bit of my memory. Proof:
UT2k4 consuming all but 50mbs of my 1gb of RAM after only a single map. After several hours of gaming, the game consumes more and more RAM as different objects, maps, and textures are loaded.
This is even worse:
HL2 with nothing in the background. Observe the blue line (the left part of the graph is after I exited the game). The free physical RAM was depleted in several instances. HL2 stutters and the hd light comes on when it does. That's a sign that it's begging for RAM, as the graph supports. Furthermore, it takes about 10 seconds to exit the game. The desktop slowly returns and redraws itself, and then it takes a long time to reopen my applications as my 74gb Raptor thrashes away to empty the page file and fill the RAM back up with the data it previously contained.
That's exactly what every game has done when I've needed more RAM. In 1998 I had 64 MBs of RAM and played Tribes. It exited slowly. I upgraded to 128 MBs. Instant exits. In 2000 I upgraded to an Athlon 1 GHz system, still with 128 MBs of RAM and I began playing Tribes 2. It exited slowly. I upgraded to 256 MBs and it then exited instantly. More recently, for example, I bought UT2k4 last summer and had 512 MBs of RAM at the time. Not only did it exit slowly, but the system would pause for 2-5 seconds with the hd light on after several hours of onslaught (and then resume). It too exited slowly. I bought 1 GB: Now it exits instantly and doesn't pause. However, that's with moderate settings. As you can see in the image above, slightly higher settings consume even 1 GB of RAM! Also, that image was taken with only about 20 players in the server. I usually play with 32 players, and that uses more memory.
Each time I've made a major upgrade people advise, "You don't need X RAM. Stick with the amount you have now." And each time I've followed their advice, and then end up upgrading my brand new computer only 6 to 9 months later after the rest of the forumunites realize that it's time to move to the new standard. I'm not going to do that this time. RAM prices are cheap, and I don't want to upgrade for the next 3 years.
I can see that I need more RAM already, and even though only a few applications can utilize it now, I can assure you that in than 6 to 12 months 2 GBs will be the standard and the new games will demand it to run smoothly, just like the huge difference between 512mb and 1gb now.
To support that claim, look up the minimum specs on the soon-to-be-available HL2: Lost Coast update. It
requires 1 GB of RAM. Requires = bare minimum = runs like junk.
Cliffs: I'm getting 2 GBs of RAM.