7 Benefits of Adding More RAM to a PC – Detailed Guide

RAM is the most important hardware to enhance the performance of your PC. Unlike CPU and GPU upgrades that might cost you a fortune, RAM upgrades are cheaper and easier to carry out. There are several benefits of adding more RAM to your PC and in this guide, we will discuss them one by one.

Advantages of Having More RAM in a PC

Here are some of the advantages you can expect by upgrading your memory:

1- Increased Performance

Computers have become more powerful in the last few years and for a better computing experience, programs and applications are highly dependent upon more RAM. If you are frequently dealing with multiple tasks at the same time, then you have to have more RAM on your PC.

For example, each tab that you open in Google Chrome consumes some part of your ram. And if you open up to 15 tabs in Google Chrome, then most likely all of those tabs will consume around 1GB to 2GB RAM in total, that’s a lot of RAM space being occupied.

So, with a little amount of ram left behind, your computer will experience slowdowns. Upgrading your RAM will prevent your PC from slowdowns while dealing with multiple tasks at a single time. Also, this will improve your browsing experience with internet browsers like Google Chrome.

By adding more RAM to your PC, switching between programs becomes quicker and smoother no matter what version of Windows you are using. A bigger amount of RAM reduces the load on your CPU, and this helps the CPU to read data much faster.

2- Efficient Gaming Experience

If you have a better CPU or GPU but don’t have enough RAM on your computer, you might suffer from lags and freezes during your gameplay. Especially, when building a gaming PC, you have to be careful in choosing the amount of memory.

Adding more RAM results in faster computing performance to overcome issues like bottlenecking in demanding tasks like gaming. Modern-day game titles need at least 4GB to 6GB of RAM on your computer for efficient performance.

Most AAA games consume up to 10GB of RAM, so if you are a professional gamer, having more RAM will keep you away from slower performance in gaming.

3- Quick Startup Time

A PC with a lower amount of RAM struggles before system startup and takes a lot of time to prepare the desktop. The same goes for the shutdown time, with a lower amount of RAM, you might experience delays in shutdown.

One way around this is to increase the amount of RAM on your computer. By doing so, the computer manages to quickly access the files between your CPU and RAM in order to startup or shutdown.

4- Improved Network Performance

If you are experiencing slow performance while connecting your PC to a network, then it may be due to a lower amount of memory. Some networks need you to have a specific amount of RAM on your computer for a better user experience. Upgrading your RAM can result in improved connectivity.

5- Helps in Content Creation

Content creation applications have become more “RAM Hungry” over the past few years. We now have professional video, photo, and graphics designing applications that need a higher capacity of RAM for smoother performance.

In terms of Photo Editing, 4GB of RAM will do the job as well. But if you are a professional video editor who usually deals with retouching videos at 4K quality, then you have to go with either 16GB or 32GB RAM if you need better performance. And among all the tasks in content creation, video editing eats a lot of RAM when exporting files at higher resolutions.

So having more RAM in your computer will decrease the export time of your videos and prevent any laggy performance.

6- Fast Data Transfer

When transferring files, there’s a speed at which data is being transferred among different devices connected to a computer. Whenever you select files and click on “Copy”, those files are immediately copied to your RAM. If the capacity of files exceeds the amount of RAM, you might experience a slower data transfer speed while pasting your files.

So another advantage of having enough RAM on your computer is that it allows you to transfer files at a faster speed.

7-Improved Printing Experience

Yes, this might look awful but, having enough RAM will decrease the time it takes to print large files. As more data is buffered between your CPU and RAM, printing larger file become much quicker on a laptop or PC.

Tips for Adding More RAM

You will find at least 2 or more DIMM slots on your motherboard. DIMM slot is a space on which you can install a ram. Before buying a RAM module, make sure there’s an empty DIMM slot left on your motherboard to accommodate the new RAM stick.

So, how would you know that you need a RAM upgrade? Well, it’s simple to check out by visiting your “Task Manager” tab and then heading over to the RAM usage section. Run any program on your computer and see if your RAM Usage is over 80% or not. If this is the case, then you are running low on RAM and you need to increase the RAM capacity of your computer.

As you can see in the image above, the RAM usage statistics show that PC is using almost 39% of RAM. So in this case, there’s no need to add more RAM. Generally, if the RAM usage ratio stays under 80%, then there’s no sense in upgrading your RAM.

Installing more RAM will definitely help you if you frequently deal with memory-intensive programs like gaming or video editing.

Note: There’s a certain limit up to which you should upgrade your RAM. Let’s say if you need 16GB of RAM but you go all the way up to 64GB, this would be overkill without any extra performance gain.

How Much RAM Do You Need

The amount of RAM you need depends upon the type of tasks you are going to interact with: But for better understanding see the table below:

2GB to 4GB	If you are just using your PC for general tasks like internet surfing, light gaming, and watching movies up to 720p resolution
4GB to 6GB	Better for dealing with gaming up to 720p, browsing the internet, watching videos up to 1080p resolution, sending emails,
6GB to 8GB	Good for casual gamers and basic content creation. An ideal amount for multitasking and switching between applications
8GB & Above	Ideal for hardcore gamers, server PCs, and professional content creators

Bottom Line

Winding up, the more RAM you have on your computer, the more workspace your computer will have to run the programs and applications faster. If you have a slow running computer, then upgrading your RAM is the cheapest solution to increase its overall performance.