More RAM or Faster RAM?

Random Access Memory, one of the core components of you computer. While todays computers have an average 4-8 GB of RAM in the future we will need to use more RAM as technology becomes more and more complex. So here's how it goes... you go to the computer store and go to where the ram is, and you see 4 specific specifications:

Type | Latency | Frequency | Amount |

For now we will throw out Latency since it doesn't affect ram that much.

Type

You have DDR, DDR2, DDR3 and the new DDR4

The type ram can define how efficient ram is, for example DDR2 produces less heat and uses less electricity than DDR and so on, also because of that, also each type can have different speeds as the way they are designed are different.

Frequency

This is measured in MHz and it is pretty the speed of your RAM. Higher frequency means it takes less time for your processor to access your ram so in theory you get higher access times and more responsive programs. Also the type of ram plays a role here, since each time has a maximum frequency limit.

The only thing we should be looking at is the Data Rate and the voltage, as you can see with each generation ram gets faster and uses less power!

Amount

This defines how much actual memory the ram stick has, most sticks nowadays had 4GB per stick or even 8GB! Usually AAA title video games need 8 GB, 12GB some even 16GB! (I'm looking at you Battlefield 1!), for now 8 GB is fine if your an average gamer,

The Final Question: More RAM or Faster RAM?

Answer: More RAM

For now faster ram doesn't necessarily change the performance (I've seen some small improvements for just 5-6 fps but i don't think that wont make the gameplay any smoother). For now aim for more RAM. Only when ram reaches speeds of 5000+ MHz then we will see a difference! For now that's it!

Fun Facts!

Because RAM is Volatile, when it loses power it's data is permanently lost. However before hard disks were made old devices used ram with bateries inside them to keep them online as seen in the Apple Newton MessagePad 110, where it had a backup battery to make sure data wasn't lost.