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+--- Thread: Is 8GB RAM enough these days? (/showthread.php?tid=239544)
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Is 8GB RAM enough these days? - JEBB - 04-03-2020
I see a number of ads for Macs with 8GB RAM. I am using a 2012 Macbook Pro with 16GB RAM and sometimes it seems to be too little when I am running a number of apps. Perhaps newer Macs are better than my old Mac?
Re: Is 8GB RAM enough these days? - Lew Zealand - 04-03-2020
Yes when swap can happen at 3GB/s, however more RAM is always better.
For instance, my job can easily be done with 8GB RAM and no swapping because that's what I use every day, a 2018 Mini with 8GB. But my job is simply not RAM intensive being mostly web-based. Anyone doing media work certainly needs 16GB minimum, possibly more if time really = money.
Re: Is 8GB RAM enough these days? - JoeH - 04-03-2020
Depends on what you are going to do with the Mac. 8 GB would be the minimum now, an SSD for a drive may make it a bit less noticeable when the system has to go to swap.
But from a what I am seeing, some of the software developers are just not paying attention to memory management at all. I see many mainstream applications just blowing up their RAM usage with fairly obvious memory leaks. In that environment about all you can do to keep up with their sloppiness is have more RAM installed.
P.S. This also applies to recent versions of macOS. Add in a plethora of background services that many of which could just be turned off unless needed, the OS has its own problems.
Re: Is 8GB RAM enough these days? - space-time - 04-03-2020
Who needs more than 640kB?
Re: Is 8GB RAM enough these days? - jdc - 04-03-2020
JEBB wrote:
I see a number of ads for Macs with 8GB RAM. I am using a 2012 Macbook Pro with 16GB RAM and sometimes it seems to be too little when I am running a number of apps. Perhaps newer Macs are better than my old Mac?
Assuming it has a SSD?
What does "seems too little" mean? Perhaps the issues arent RAM related? and lets just throw out the fact that we are discussing the performance of a near 8 year old computer...
I have 32, no idea if I bump up against it... but I want 64... which is impossible with my current mac...
Re: Is 8GB RAM enough these days? - sekker - 04-03-2020
Modern Macs with SSDs, 8GB is fine so long as you keep at least 1/3 or so of the SSD space free for virtual memory.
Re: Is 8GB RAM enough these days? - C(-)ris - 04-04-2020
SSD and 8GB of ram is perfectly fine for general use. Even for basic Creative Cloud use it is ok. My main rig is a 2018 MacBook Air with 8GB of ram and a 256GB SSD.
Re: Is 8GB RAM enough these days? - RgrF - 04-04-2020
Grass is always greener, I have 16 and am jonesing for 32.
Re: Is 8GB RAM enough these days? - NewtonMP2100 - 04-04-2020
....that's what she said.....!!!!
Re: Is 8GB RAM enough these days? - freeradical - 04-04-2020
I have 16 GB, but I'm also running Windows 10 under VMware Fusion.