Will upgrading RAM increase my FPS?

[Pluto☭]

Hello, so I got this new laptop Acer Nitro 5 with RTX 3060 95W, Ryzen 7 5800H and 8GB RAM but either the composition is weak or my RAM needs an upgrade, or I am doing something wrong. Cities Skylines 45 fps, Troy Total War 35fps, Arma 3 25 fps everything on highest settings. Please will upgrade help? Thanks.

[CZI]

Most likely not.
For laptop, make sure to connect power cable and set High Performance on Power Options.

[✪ILoveEatingBEEF]

yes it will but only a bit

[Pluto☭]

I did both, but I forgot to say, when I opened task manager RAM usage was around 90-102%...

[𝕙.𝕓𝕒𝕣𝕜𝕒𝕤]

A gaming laptop should have 16GB RAM minimum. In order to make prices more attractive many computers still come with only 8GB.

[Muppet among Puppets]

Some games need more ram if a lot is build.
But i would look what takes all that ram, what you donrt need to run first.

While 8gb ram does not fit to that hardware choice

[nullable]

More ram wouldn't hurt. It could increase your FPS any time your limited RAM is the reason for lower FPS.

I personally won't run less than 16GB now, even if 8GB could get you buy in a lot of instances. And RAM is cheap, relatively speaking.

Although what's your screen res. If it was 4K that might explain it...

[Muppet among Puppets]

I only ever reached max ram when a game had a memory leak.
And then fps would be fine a while, but then it would be laggy for a few moments, and returning.
But that was with 4gb ram, while 8 was normal. So i noticed the leak.

Not sure if less ram would just reduce fps.

[nullable]

Well just less wouldn't just reduce FPS, as long as the lesser amount was still enough to meet the resource needs. Little enough RAM, like where you have to hit the page file to keep the system going would certainly impact performance because even a gen4 NVMe is still like 100 times slower than RAM.

And where that amount is depends on the game + whatever is running in the background.

But that's why I asked about resolution, because I feel like using a midrangey card like 3060 that would struggle in lots of games at 4K would be a better or more impactful culprit.

[CZI]

Originally posted by Pluto☭:

I did both, but I forgot to say, when I opened task manager RAM usage was around 90-102%...

Ah, I missed 8GB part. Better to have at least 16GB for gaming in general.

It may be check following as well for Nvidia card laptop:

====
Issue: Laptop with Nvidia card caps around 40fps

Solution:

It could be caused by Nvidia's WhisperMode and should be disabled for this game.

So check the game's setting in Nvidia Control panel.

https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce/technologies/whisper-mode/

Ref.
https://steamcommunity.com/app/544750/discussions/0/2577696996220009109/

====

And some more info at "Windows 10 configuration" may help

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2192326393

[rawWwRrr]

Originally posted by Pluto☭:

Hello, so I got this new laptop Acer Nitro 5 with RTX 3060 95W, Ryzen 7 5800H and 8GB RAM but either the composition is weak or my RAM needs an upgrade, or I am doing something wrong. Cities Skylines 45 fps, Troy Total War 35fps, Arma 3 25 fps everything on highest settings. Please will upgrade help? Thanks.

I would suggest upgrading the RAM to get at least 16GB in total. You won't get as much of a boost to FPS, but you'll get better load times, less lag, and the system overall will "breathe" better having more memory to move applications in and out of without having to constantly access disk cache. 8GB is tight these days.

[Pluto☭]

Originally posted by Snakub Plissken:

More ram wouldn't hurt. It could increase your FPS any time your limited RAM is the reason for lower FPS.

I personally won't run less than 16GB now, even if 8GB could get you buy in a lot of instances. And RAM is cheap, relatively speaking.

Although what's your screen res. If it was 4K that might explain it...

The resolution was 1920x1080 all the time. What I can't understand is when I tested Troy Total War I clicked on recommended graphic option and it maxed everything on ultra but the benchmark test ran at around 25 fps...

[Pluto☭]

@CZI I will try, but the Nvidia link is not working for me, can you please check that?

[The Brown Hornet]

Go dual channel, update drivers, if that doesn't work something's wrong with your laptop

[concussious]

You need "more" of any subsystem only if that subsystem is overloaded.
As an example, most cars would benefit from better tires and brakes instead of more HP.

Measure the ram usage (e.g. task manager, system monitor, top) while running the games you play, if it exceeds 80%, you will benefit from installing more.
It's that simple, "recommended" amounts for "general gaming" is pure consumer propaganda. Some of the best games ever made can't even use 1Gb, some games will exceed 10Gb.

A detailed answer: If any computer runs out of memory, the entire system dies. Thus when exceeding ~95%, the system uses your storage disc as a temporary memory (called swap), and moves whatever it can over there. That's massively slower, but the OS should be smart enough to move inactive programs first to cause the least amount of disruption. When the system starts doing this (called "swapping") this will impact your frame rates severely, but only while the system is actively swapping the memory around, e.g. ~2 seconds of really stuttering, then back to normal.

In the case of RAM specifically, if you have two sticks, the system spreads the load over both, so adding a second stick is always faster, but usually by no more than 5%.

[CZI]

Originally posted by Pluto☭:

@CZI I will try, but the Nvidia link is not working for me, can you please check that?

If you mean the following link, it works for me.
https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce/technologies/whisper-mode/