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I am not a gamer. Most of the processes are usually in chrome as I have many tabs open constantly, along with a few other applications that I like to run pretty much constantly. I'm deciding between upgrading to 6gb for $90 or 8gb for $180. I have read that since the 6gb will be in two mismatched memory sticks, this will utilize only single channel, while the 8gb (2x4gb) would utilize dual channel.

Questions:

  • How much of a difference will the dual channel vs single channel configuration really make?

  • Ignoring dual/single channel for a second, for my purposes would I ever notice a difference between having 6gb and 8gb? I would like to utilize the least amount of virtual memory possible, but if it's going to make zero difference for me I'd rather not pay the extra $90.

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  • Assuming say 40 tabs in chrome what kind of other processes do you use?
    – cybernard
    Jan 4, 2014 at 21:03
  • Do you, or will you in the near future use any kind of virtualization programs? Virtualbox, vmware, or etc.
    – cybernard
    Jan 4, 2014 at 21:04
  • it's not uncommon for me to have 50+ tabs in chrome open, along with things like iTunes, windows media player, music production and audio editing software. I do have virtualbox actually. Why do you ask?
    – Tim
    Jan 4, 2014 at 21:35
  • virtualbox likes memory... a lot. Depending on how many you run at once and which OS you virtualize.
    – cybernard
    Jan 4, 2014 at 23:30

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Dual vs single channel will make very little difference in terms of performance for web browsing. You have not specified your OS, but (under Linux) I found that I didn't need to get more memory - I have 4 gigs - in order to improve my browsing performance after a long time I needed to modify the way swap works, so it would not kick in while there was significant cache memory available.

It is unlikely you would notice the difference between 6 and 8 gigs if your memory management is correct. I note that utilizing virtual memory is not bad, its only paging in and out of it thats bad.

Also, you have not specified how much memory you are upgrading from. I've inferred its probably 2 gigs and the options are to put in a single 4 gig dim and keep the 2 gigs, or replace the 2 gig dim with a 4 gig dim and get a second one, in which case an upgrade to 6 gigs is heaps, and if you find its not enough you can always replace the second DIMM afterwards.

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  • I'm using Windows 7 64bit. "I note that utilizing virtual memory is not bad, its only paging in and out of it thats bad." Isn't that what utilizing virtual memory entails though? Thanks for the response. Also I'm upgrading from 3gb (1x1gb and 1x2gb).
    – Tim
    Jan 4, 2014 at 21:21
  • Well, lets say you have drivers which the system needs to load but you don't actually use - in this case it is efficient to load them and push them to Virtual memory. As they are never actually used the code is not called and the memory they take is free for other purposes. This is quite a common scenario. I am unaware of a good way of modifying the way windows handles swapping - you can disable the page file which will help - until they system runs out of memory altogether when it will crash hard. (If you are just using web browsing that should work in practice, but not recommended)
    – davidgo
    Jan 4, 2014 at 21:29
  • It might be an idea to use a smaller (say 1gig), fixed size page file and also contemplate if the extra $90 might be better spent on an SSD drive where you can locate said swap file, along with other things you access often.
    – davidgo
    Jan 4, 2014 at 21:31
  • I just figured if I had more ram that it would reduce the amount of paging, no? Drivers, etc are fine, but as of now my computer is constantly using virtual memory for my chrome usage and other main applications and it's really slowing things down.
    – Tim
    Jan 4, 2014 at 21:33
  • More RAM can reduce paging, but it depends on the OS algorythms which define paging. Bear in mind is the OS typically tries to work out what should be cached in memory and what should be paged to disk. It will make these decisions regardless of how much memory you have, and will still swap - unless you disable swap altogether. The magic bullet is a better OS, but then you need to change your usage around the OS. As indicated, on my Linux systems fixing a massive swap problem with Firefox and 4 gigs of memory was a 1 line fix - and nothing similar appears to exist in Windows 7.
    – davidgo
    Jan 4, 2014 at 21:42

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