Question Is it worth upgrading my RAM to 32GB ?

[christofferskr]

I recently upgraded my GPU to a 4070 Super. Now I'm thinking about upgrading my ram from 3200mhz cl15 16gb to 3600mhz cl18 32gb. I can't find 3600mhz cl16 ram for a reasonable price where I live. A 32gb kit will cost me around $110 new and $80 used.

I do run a pretty well debloated Windows and I never have more than a tab or two running while gaming. I do plan on playing some "heavier" titles, but wonder if spending $110/$80 will be a waste of money.
My CPU is a Ryzen 5800X3D.

 

[Eximo]

Those are quite high prices, where are you at?

$68 in the US for the cheapest 3600 CL16 2x16GB kit.

If you are running into memory limits while gaming, sure. There are quite a few games that would prefer more than 16GB today and you may gain a significant boost in things like 1% lows. However, an X3D chip solves a lot of RAM capacity issues just by having the extra cache, preventing memory calls, the reason they are superior for gaming.

Look for 4000 and 4400 kits as well sometimes they are priced relatively low, you can always run them at 3600 with tighter timings if you don't mind the tweaking.

 

[christofferskr]

Those are quite high prices, where are you at?

$68 in the US for the cheapest 3600 CL16 2x16GB kit.

If you are running into memory limits while gaming, sure. There are quite a few games that would prefer more than 16GB today and you may gain a significant boost in things like 1% lows. However, an X3D chip solves a lot of RAM capacity issues just by having the extra cache, preventing memory calls, the reason they are superior for gaming.

Look for 4000 and 4400 kits as well sometimes they are priced relatively low, you can always run them at 3600 with tighter timings if you don't mind the tweaking.

I live in Norway where the selection and prices arent very good. I guess I'll wait as I'm not having any issues for now. Maybe pick some up if some go on sale.

 

[Eximo]

Sounds reasonable.

DDR4 production will start to ramp down and the lower prices of today may not last. They are still selling a lot of AM4 and DDR4 Intel boards, so should be a few years yet.

 

[christofferskr]

Sounds reasonable.

DDR4 production will start to ramp down and the lower prices of today may not last. They are still selling a lot of AM4 and DDR4 Intel boards, so should be a few years yet.

My motherboard is a Asus Rog b450-f. Will it be able to handle 4600mhz ram or will it have stability issues? I could get my hands on a 4600mhz kit used for a decent price.

 

[NedSmelly]

Steve at HUB/Techspot has covered this question in detail.

How Much RAM Do Gamers Need? 16GB vs. 32GB vs. 64GB

How much RAM do gamers need? It's a question we get asked a lot, and it's one we used to answer yearly with a good old-fashioned benchmark...

www.techspot.com

 

[thestryker]

Just keep in mind their testing is maximum settings and rather than swapping DRAM out they partitioned it which can skew results. It's still a fairly useful rundown though.

Essentially it'll depend on what you do while gaming and how you use your system as to whether or not you'll even notice the difference. Personally speaking I'd base the decision on how much longer the system is going to be used as primary and how close to running out of DRAM it is already. I never had any problems with 16GB DRAM and the only reason I have 32GB right now is I was building a second system, needed to buy 4 sticks of memory so going 32GB at the time was the only thing that made sense.

 

[js2]

No.

I recently upgraded my system with a 4070 super. I'm thinking about upgrading my ram from 3200mhz cl15 16gb to 3600mhz cl18 32gb. I can't find 3600mhz cl16 ram for a reasonable price where I live. A 32gb kit will cost me around $110 new and $80 used.
I do run a pretty debloated windows and I never have more than a tab or two running while gaming. I do plan on playing some "heavier" titles, but wonder if spending $110/$80 will be a waste of money. My cpu is a 5800x3d.

No. Unless you are doing graphics work, you will not be using 32gb often enough to justify price. Better to get a bigger and faster nvme instead.

 

[Eximo]

My motherboard is a Asus Rog b450-f. Will it be able to handle 4600mhz ram or will it have stability issues? I could get my hands on a 4600mhz kit used for a decent price.

I don't think you can get 4600 working on Ryzen, certainly not at 1:1 memory to infinity fabric speeds, but you don't have to run it that fast.

1800-1900Mhz is usually the top speed for the fabric, if you go above that it will cut the speed in half between the CPU die and the I/O die. So while the memory may be running faster, you cripple the system.

4600 CL19 or whatever, you can just lower the speed and tighten the timings. A bit laborious, but if you want to spend the time you can probably manage your 3600 CL16.

 

[Kona45primo]

The AMD X3d chips don't really benefit from fast ram timings as the extra 3d cache makes up for any slower timings. You'll likely not really see any increase in speeds outside of if you max out your 16GB.

 

[christofferskr]

The AMD X3d chips don't really benefit from fast ram timings as the extra 3d cache makes up for any slower timings. You'll likely not really see any increase in speeds outside of if you max out your 16GB.

Found someone selling the same ram I already have. Two more sticks of 8gb. If I can get it for cheap would that be better than buying two sticks of 16gb. I won't be able to upgrade speeds but I will have 4 sticks of cl15 ram with guaranteed dual ranks.

 

[christofferskr]

I don't think you can get 4600 working on Ryzen, certainly not at 1:1 memory to infinity fabric speeds, but you don't have to run it that fast.

1800-1900Mhz is usually the top speed for the fabric, if you go above that it will cut the speed in half between the CPU die and the I/O die. So while the memory may be running faster, you cripple the system.

4600 CL19 or whatever, you can just lower the speed and tighten the timings. A bit laborious, but if you want to spend the time you can probably manage your 3600 CL16.

Found someone selling the same ram I already have. Two more sticks of 8gb. If I can get it for cheap would that be better than buying two sticks of 16gb. I won't be able to upgrade speeds but I will have 4 sticks of cl15 ram with guaranteed dual ranks.