Worth moving from 2gb to 4gb on a WinXP (32bit) system?

datter · January 25th, 2009, 06:45

I was considering adding some more RAM to my rig, but as it turns out I've got two 1gb sticks so adding more will involve trying to sell this stuff off down the road and just buying two 2gb sticks. My local computer joint doesn't have (and won't be getting) any more Reaper 9200 for some reason, but they can get some OCZ Reaper 8500 by mid next week.

My question : Do you think FSX will see much real world benefit from 4gb of ram vs 2gb? I'm still not entirely sure how much of it WinXP (32bit) will actually see, nor how much FSX will be able to make use of but it's obviously an upgrade so it can't hurt.

Given that I'll be left with two extra sticks of ram I may or may not be able to get rid of, I really don't want to bother getting more RAM if I'm going to see a very minor performance increase. If on the other hand moving up to 4gb is going to give me a solid boost I'll likely go for it right away. Still considering the overclock as well, since the same local computer shop has a bunch of cooling stuff.

Anyway, do you suppose the extra ram would be worth the time/trouble/expense as far as FSX goes?

Thanks.

My system:
Q6600 quad
2gb OCZ Reaper 9200 ram
nVidia 8800GT x2 (sli)
etc

harleyman · January 25th, 2009, 06:56

There is literally no time or trouble involved to adding ram...

And a big YES to seeing an increase....It will inly show aroung 3.5 gigs on XP...But thats normal...And if your are all up to date on your SP's (I think you are) then you just need to add the ram...

The old ram is not worth much..I suggest you put it into the new Ram container and save it just incase you have a ram issue later..Then you have Ram that you know is good to swap out for testing...

More Ram will probably not give you better frames ( that comes with Bigger CPU or an OC ) but it will run FSX smoother as it will all load much faster...Its your cheapest upgrade for FSX you can do....

**txnetcop** · January 25th, 2009, 07:40

Yes in spite of what you hear, Harleyman is right, FSX will address up to 2.8 gb of RAM maybe a little more.
Ted

**fliger747** · January 25th, 2009, 07:47

I have added 2 gigs of ram recently to my quad "corps" which is still running XP. Indeed it only accesses about 3 gigs of this and so far I have not seen much if any improvement. However FSX was not the reason for the added RAM, as I do work with some very large (100 MB+) photo files.

I also added a terabyte drive, easy enough to fill an 8 gig card in an afternoon in Hong Kong!

Cheers: T.

***PRB*** · January 25th, 2009, 07:52

I have the 64 bit version of Windows XP, so I'm not sure if my experience applies, but...

I went from 2 GB to 4 GB and the improvement in framerates was HUGE. That was the only change I made. No video card, no tweaks of any sort. The sim went from being un-flyable (7 FPS) to enjoyable (20+ FPS).

**stansdds** · January 25th, 2009, 10:09

Hmmm... I'm running Win XP Home SP2 (32 bit) and 2 GB of RAM, E6850 overclocked to 3.6GHz and a factory overclocked 8800GT (512MB RAM); perhaps going to 4GB of RAM might improve my system as well.

harleyman · January 25th, 2009, 10:14

It will ... More ram = faster texture loading which can turn in to more frames in some cases..but it will be smoother never the less........

datter · January 25th, 2009, 10:19

So many conflicting reports about all this, I'm not sure what I want to do. More ram will help, more ram won't help much. 32bit, 64bit... I don't know. Maybe I should just go with an overclock. This system is pretty much built for that anyway.

Time for more reading.

datter · January 25th, 2009, 11:08

UGH... the most readily available cooler to me (at my local shop) is this one which is apparently pretty good. This review of it is talking about needing to take the motherboard out to install it. Can't say I care for that idea.

EDIT: Nevermind about that, reading further on they give some other options.

harleyman · January 25th, 2009, 12:53

That cooler has 4 push and lock legs..It does not require the motherboard to be removed.....

It says that you may want to do so for more elbow room is all..Is you have a fullsize case there is plenty of room...

BTW...That is my mobo in the pic they are using..The Gigabyte X48 DQ6.....

**David_L6** · January 25th, 2009, 13:02

Originally Posted by datter

I was considering adding some more RAM to my rig,

Do it! I like lots of RAM (see my sig).

harleyman · January 25th, 2009, 13:49

Thanks David...I was just comming back to again say that 2 gigs of ram makes for an unhappy FSX...

The cheapest upgrade for FSX IS better(faster) / more ram.....

datter · January 25th, 2009, 14:07

Still reading about all this, not sure why I torture myself so.

Great article in PDF format here that compares real world tests using FSX (and other titles) on 2gb vs 4gb.

EDIT: From the article, there's not a lot of frame rate to be gained in FSX from 4gb vs 2gb, though from what I gather it will reduce page file access and thus possibly increase smoothness etc as harleyman was stating above. Task switching has huge gains with 4gb.

I think I'll stop thinking about this for the day and go fly something.

harleyman · January 25th, 2009, 14:26

Originally Posted by datter

Still reading about all this, not sure why I torture myself so.

Great article in PDF format here that compares real world tests using FSX (and other titles) on 2gb vs 4gb.

EDIT: From the article, there's not a lot of frame rate to be gained in FSX from 4gb vs 2gb, though from what I gather it will reduce page file access and thus possibly increase smoothness etc as harleyman was stating above. Task switching has huge gains with 4gb.

I think I'll stop thinking about this for the day and go fly something.

You are just like me....LOL Give it a rest then..They sell Ram every day...LOL Coolers too....

have fun

**jschall** · March 1st, 2009, 05:30

Originally Posted by harleyman

I was just coming back to again say that 2 gigs of ram makes for an unhappy FSX...The cheapest upgrade for FSX IS better(faster) / more ram.....

Harleyman, could you please clarify - to gain the benefit of upgrading from 2GB to 4GB of RAM, on a 32-bit Windows machine, do you have to tweak/edit fsx.exe itself, as discussed over here?:
http://www.highflightsimulations.com/ctd.html
"First you will need to download CFF Explorer Suite. This is the program that will allow you to edit the fsx.exe or any other*.exe file."

I have no trouble spending $50 or so on 4GB RAM, but I want to give FSX the ability to USE it!

- Jeff

harleyman · March 1st, 2009, 05:41

Hi Jeff...

Normally there is nothing you need to do...FSX service packs address that issue..So.If you are running FSX SP 1 you are golden..

The only other deal is with XP (need at least SP2)

And Vista 64 you need SP1

If you have those you are all set.....

You may not see hugh frame improvements(so do) but it will load faster and help with displaying textures faster which is a plus...