Unhindered and favorable performance is all that a gamer cares about during his gaming sessions. Computers are capable of providing a more seamless experience than any console available, however, achieving such a level of smoothness does require a hard sum of money to back up your rig in the process.
Moreover, DRAM does have its utmost significance in the whole build, as it is responsible for handling and assisting the CPU and GPU in almost every process, especially the games. So, let’s take a look at how memory can affect gaming and is having more of it helps in improving performance, or it’s just useless.
RAM and Gaming Performance
DRAM kits influence pretty much every aspect of gaming, inadequate capacity or speed can ruin the whole experience by causing lag, stutters, and inconsistency in frame rates.
Games nowadays require quite a lot of memory for them to work properly and in an optimal state, as DRAM fetches the game assets from the storage drives and keeps them temporarily until the CPU and GPU needs it to render upcoming frames.
Since DRAM is way faster than any storage drive, the assets get delivered to the CPU and GPU in an instance, ultimately resulting in a higher number of FPS.
Furthermore, it also impacts the loading times, meaning if you’re running low on speed and memory capacity than required by the game, then you most likely see longer loading times than what you originally anticipated.
Because the game assets are being transferred to the CPU and GPU at slower transfer rates. However, when the circumstances are entirely reversed, your game will load much quicker and will run smoother as well.
Minimum vs. Recommended RAM
Games have become more memory-intensive, and most developers suggest you have at least 16 GB of them inside your computer.
Otherwise, you will be facing numerous issues such as stutters, lags, slower loading times, and sometimes even crashes.
So it’s better to keep your system up to date. Having minimum memory suggested by the game devs is a must, however, if you have more than what the game actually requires, then that’s a bonus.
Having more than recommended memory in your system makes you ready for upcoming titles which will be more hardware-demanding because of the enhanced graphics, physics, along with all other high-quality assets and effects they will offer.
But what does having more RAM really mean in numbers? Well, because almost every game asks for 16 or 24 GB of memory capacity for optimal gaming experience, so if your computer boasts 32 or 64 GB of memory, you’re up for any current and upcoming titles, even if you plan to run it on 4K resolution.
Not to mention, with higher memory capacity, multitasking is more consistent and smooth even if you’re running heavy stuff in the background.
Games like Star Wars Jedi Survivor, Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020, and Hogwarts Legacy make good use of the extra available memory and exhibit a significantly smoother performance than the recommended required memory.
When the game you’re about to play is heavily unoptimized and struggles to run smoothly even with the recommended required specifications, then having extra memory does help in eliminating lag and stutters to some extent.
Multitasking and Background Processes
Having more RAM also enables you to multitask without an issue, even if you’re playing a game. Let’s say the game eats up to 17 GB of memory, and you have a 32 GB kit installed in your computer, then the extra RAM can effectively handle other tasks that you will be performing such as playing music on the browser or recording/streaming your gameplay.
All these tasks are resources heavy, so the excessive amount of RAM proves to be advantageous in such situations and allows you to be more productive. You can check out some detailed reviews of Rams and see how they perform in different tasks.
Running a lot of applications in the background while having insufficient memory at hand can cause stutters and frame drops in the game.
The abundance of applications running in the background eats up the memory that otherwise could have been used by the game. This is why the game struggles to maintain consistent frame rates, as the CPU and GPU are having trouble receiving the game assets on time – resulting in potential frame drops and stutters.
It is one of those situations where installing an adequate amount of RAM can reduce the stutters and frame drops significantly.
RAM Speed and Latency
As much as the RAM capacity is important, having the right frequency and CAS latency also helps in improving the performance of the game.
The higher the memory speed, the quicker the game assets will be accessed by the CPU and GPU, which will help in generating more frames.
On top of the RAM speed, the CAS latency needs to be tight, the tighter the memory timings, the better the RAM will perform. CAS latency means the cycles that the memory takes to complete and deliver the data to the CPU.
For the DDR4 platforms, 3200 and 3600 MHz with CL16-18 timings are the two most balanced configurations you should be looking for, as they don’t cost as much and offer great performance by transferring game assets onto the CPU and GPU for timely frame render.
In the case of the all-new DDR5 memory sticks, you should consider getting something with 5600-6000 MHz speed and CL32-36 timings.
Conclusion
Now that we have seen thoroughly that having more memory does improve the overall game performance.
The recent increase in the minimum memory requirements has rendered the 8 GB obsolete and established new standards for the minimum requirements, and now games require you to have at least 12-16 GB of RAM for 1080p resolutions.
However, if you wish to game on higher resolutions, then you better get yourself a 32 GB kit with decent timings and speeds, so you can keep enjoying your games at higher resolutions without facing stutters, lags, frame drops, or crashes due to insufficient memory.
Hopefully, this article will help in the best way possible, and you make an informed decision regarding the memory size that you will be going with.
