16GB v. 32GB RAM

[fppilot 4,355]

1 hour ago, flying_w said:

Anyone have an experience of going from 16GB to 32GB of RAM and the difference, if any, it made to the simulator?  It's decision time, a tricky one as I'll be looking at an all new PC within 9 months.

I just spec'd a new build today and have 32gb (2x16)  DDR4 3600 going in it for $119.00.  Will your current system accommodate that?  Pretty inexpensive and would transfer to your new system when the time arrives.

[Superdelphinus 718]

54 minutes ago, Akila said:

yes, I did during the Alpha Phase. with 16GB you almost guaranteed to experience CTD while loading the SIM on a high complex
area with MEDIUM / HIGH settings due to OOM. unfortunately you will not get any following message telling you about the cause crash, but it will show up as an event under the "Application" section in your event view console. once you upgrade to 32GB , you will not experience those CTD any more.

I raised this number of times to the Devs during the Alpha phase, offering one of the following ideas i had in mind:

Option 1. start shooting warning in SIM that it is close to OOM and if already crash the SIM to desktop, at lease follow it with a message stating the OOM cause of crash.

Option 2. the better approach, implement an adaptive graphics/ texture/ control, that can dynamically increase/decrease the graphics quality based on RAM/VRAM vacancy/availability.
that way you even prevent the crash in the 1st place…

but I did not get any response. I hope they will adopt one of the solutions i offered or any other possible alternative.
 

I’ve been using it for the last 3 or 4 months with 16gb ram and haven’t had a single memory crash. The only time I could make it crash was with a very particular location that always seemed to cause it problems (and I’ve no idea why, it was basically a very small airport in the middle of nowhere!). Fine in the gold master. 

[Kpeters 42]

For some reason now it hasn't used more than 5GB of RAM on my system? something is wrong....

[zalox 54]

I supouse it could help to avoid some stutters, not enought RAM need to read and load from HDD/SSD to RAM again so often that can you apreciate it like losing FPS.

 

[MrBitstFlyer 3,837]

51 minutes ago, Crrispy said:

Hello,

32 GB is interesting not only for FS, because you can completely disable the paging file, then you are sure Windows will never page memory on disk.

Soon as I follow this advice, my Oculus Rift S VR software goes haywire.  It crashes on load or insists it needs an update - update it and back to asking for an update.  Re-instate the pagefile and all is well.

[Oldschool61 38]

1 hour ago, flying_w said:

Thanks for the insight,  I wasn't too clear in my dilema.  Do I go 32GB right now in my current PC (i7-6700K, 16GB, 980Ti) just to enjoy the experience more until the next PC gets built in around 9 months time.  What's the bang for the buck of 32GB over 16 so to speak?

Realistically, you probably only need the ram and a video upgrade.

[flying_w 58]

Today I have 16GB of PC3000.  Your suggesion is such an obvious thing to do I don't know why I hadn't considered taking the RAM with me to the new machine.  I guess I just assumed I'd buy whatever the fastest is at that time and selling the incumbant for next to nothing.  The question then becomes, how much difference to MSFS does RAM speed have?  But before that, I think a RAM upgrade will be on it's way here soon.

Thanks all - this has been an interesting topic to discuss.

 

[OzWhitey 3,353]

Tech comments from testing so far (n case useful for anyone);

i9 9900K @4.9, 2080 Ti, 32 gig Gskill:

Over London with Orbx London City Airport: CPU at 30%, GPU at 75% using 20 gig+ of RAM

Summary:

• You definitely want 32 gig RAM
• GPU - 3080TI would be great!

 

 

[flyinion 280]

I definitely gotta suggest 32 if you can do it as well.  Loading the glass cockpit cessna into KSEA with no weather, on High, with a few settings on medium, I hit 20GB of RAM in use overall at 1440p (not sure if resolution matters in this case).  The sim itself after loading was averaging 10-16GB depending on what I was doing and where I was at.  Would it use a good chunk less if I only had 16?  Who knows, but I'm really glad now I decided to go 32GB a year ago when I built my system.

Edited August 19, 2020 by flyinion

[rtodepart 761]

I can confirm that 16GB at least in my case was a no go . I took off 2 sticks and went down to 16 to see what it was like and now i think that in my humble opinion they should of made 32GB the minimum requirements .... my board in old and can only take 64GB max i think ill hold on to what i got and upgrade later to a board that can at least handle 128GB ram . 

[G-RFRY 1,708]

Depends on your settings and streaming rolling cache, 4K ULTRA HD live weather real AI Traffic.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/154944674@N05/50242960833/in/dateposted-public/

Memory 18.5 GPU 83% CPU Flat-out 

[Crrispy 2]

On 8/19/2020 at 11:25 PM, MrBitstFlyer said:

Soon as I follow this advice, my Oculus Rift S VR software goes haywire.  It crashes on load or insists it needs an update - update it and back to asking for an update.  Re-instate the pagefile and all is well.

That's weird. I have had the paging file completely disabled since I got 32 GB and never had a single problem with this, including with my VR headset (Pimax). And I also have the Oculus software installed, but only for compatibility reasons.

Edited August 21, 2020 by Crrispy