16GB of RAM for Photoshop or will 8GB be ok?

Hunders · 8 Jul 2012 at 20:17

Hi guys.

Currently I have 4GB and my RAM gets blasted and slows my PC right down when using PS so I want to upgrade but I'm wondering if 16GB would be wasted and that perhaps 8GB is the better option?

Can anyone advise please?

Nightglow · 8 Jul 2012 at 20:47

You need a 64bit o/s to make use use of 16gb of memory.
If you work with large files, then the extra memory is very useful.

Hunders · 8 Jul 2012 at 20:49

I have 64 bit Win 7 and I'll typically be editing 20MB RAW files from my camera.

Nightglow · 8 Jul 2012 at 21:06

I have CS5 & find it's easy to use nearly all my 32gb of memory when doing intensive editing, especially RAW files.

Muel · 8 Jul 2012 at 21:34

With RAM being so cheap, I'd recommend changing to 16gb. 4x4gb or possibly 2x8gb if you want the option to have 32gb in the future!

GravyMonster · 9 Jul 2012 at 08:50

Photoshop will munch as much RAM as you can give it, so definitely 16Gb.

A fast SSD as a scratch disk will help performance a lot too.

Hunders · 9 Jul 2012 at 10:44

Ok cool, 16GB it is then! I will get 4x4GB as my motherboard only supports 16GB so an upgrade to 32GB wouldn't be possible.

An SSD would be nice but I don't like the price per GB for them at the moment.

Cheers.

Adisan · 9 Jul 2012 at 12:50

I used photoshop on my old 3GB RAM pc, And that ran pretty much perfect.
But 16GB would be the better option.

Muel · 9 Jul 2012 at 13:02

Hunders said:
Ok cool, 16GB it is then! I will get 4x4GB as my motherboard only supports 16GB so an upgrade to 32GB wouldn't be possible.

An SSD would be nice but I don't like the price per GB for them at the moment.

Cheers.

An SSD whilst being expensive per gb is very very very cheap per performance increase. Everything feels a little bit snappier.

Storing the psd on an SSD whilst working on it would give a huge performance increase.

Narj · 9 Jul 2012 at 14:04

Once you've got 16GB you'll never look back.... Running a large VM environment with 16GB RAM and with the VMs on SSD is amazing for me, super-snappy performance and I'd never go back!