How does upgraded ram work exactly, what difference in performance can I expect?

Question

Ok, bear with me. I have a 512 and 256 card, and my operating system runs about 400 ram. If I replace the 256, that will take me from 756 to 1512 ram. Will that double my programs speed because it is double? Or will it quadruple it, because I am going from an excess of 300 ram to 1100 ram? Or is it some other solution?

Answer 1

Replace the 256 chip with another 512 to total 1 gig. It should be enough for basic computing. And RAM is inexpensive as well so you shouldn't be in an problems in regards to cost.

Answer 2

It depends. If you run a lot of programs simultaneously, you'll obviously feel the speed boost. Normally, upgraded RAM would give you noticeable speed boosts (such as start-up time and application performance), but it also depends on the overall clock of your RAM. Generally, it goes something like this:

Higher RAM Capacity == more simultaneous programs can be opened + better responsiveness
Higher RAM Clock == faster memory read/write + better responsiveness.

Overall, RAM upgrades do not hurt. Just make sure your motherboard supports your RAM and that all the memory sticks inserted have equal clocks.

Answer 3

first off you need to check with your system's manufactor to see how much ran it will hold,you can not just start installing ram until you know the 'spec's on your system,if you put to much in,the system will not even see it,I once thought the more you added,the better,i had a 256,a 512 and a 1gb,then checked with support and found it would not 'see' more than 1gb of ram,the system is build around a lot of things that in the end has to do with how much ram you can install,yes to answer your question if you put in the max it will improve it,but not quadruple it

Answer 4

With XP, you probably not notice much, maybe even no difference. However, if you are running Vista, you should notice a large difference everywhere immediatly!