Which RAM and how much of it is best for Adobe Lightroom/Photoshop?

[Toobad]

Just pondering the RAM requirements for my proposed Haswell-based multi-purpose PC (see in the Review My Build sub-forum). I'd like to know how Adobe software handles resources. Although with Win8 & programs on one SSD and caches & catalogues on another SSD, I think Adobe will still utilise ALL available RAM before then writing data to a scratch disk. Am I better off populating all 4 slots of the Asus Z87-Pro mobo with 32Gb or would 16Gb of it be essentially redundant and a waste of £85 -£100? My camera creates 30Mb picture files and I typically process around 100 photos in a session.

I'm guessing DDR3 will go the way as DDR2 and adding another 2 sticks further down the track becomes a lot more expensive as it gets superceded and stocks dry up. I won't be doing any bleeding edge overclocking but will set the mobo to auto-overclock on demand and apply XMP memory profiles.

Scan does Corsair Vengeance (2 x 8Gb) PC3-12800 at 10-10-10-27 for £99.79 (LN45195)
Ebuyer does Crucial Ballistix Tactical (2 x 8Gb) PC3-12800 at 8-8-8-24 for £85 (389659)

Low profile only becomes a consideration if all 4 slots are populated as the Arctic Freezer i30 CO may then foul. I assume kits of 4 x 8Gb are all about matching but 2 kits of 2 x 8Gb of the same make and model wouldn't be massively unmatched. I'd welcome suggestions for alternative brands too.

[Agent]

I think Adobe will still utilise ALL available RAM before then writing data to a scratch disk.

Pretty much yes.

Am I better off populating all 4 slots of the Asus Z87-Pro mobo with 32Gb or would 16Gb of it be essentially redundant and a waste of £85 -£100? My camera creates 30Mb picture files and I typically process around 100 photos in a session.

If you're just doing basic photo manipulation, 32Gb is an overkill. By 'process' do you mean batch process with the same settings? If so, then you should be closing the images on completion, which means you shouldn't ever get close to your RAM limits.

I'm guessing DDR3 will go the way as DDR2 and adding another 2 sticks further down the track becomes a lot more expensive as it gets superceded and stocks dry up. I won't be doing any bleeding edge overclocking but will set the mobo to auto-overclock on demand and apply XMP memory profiles.

DDR4 is a way off. DDR3 is here to stay at the moment as the move to DDR4 doesn't offer that much for the desktop user. Margins are thin right now in the memory sector, so pushing a new tech isn't high on the list.

Scan does Corsair Vengeance (2 x 8Gb) PC3-12800 at 10-10-10-27 for £99.79 (LN45195)
Ebuyer does Crucial Ballistix Tactical (2 x 8Gb) PC3-12800 at 8-8-8-24 for £85 (389659)

The Crucial stuff is clearly the best buy out of the two there, with faster timings.

Low profile only becomes a consideration if all 4 slots are populated as the Arctic Freezer i30 CO may then foul. I assume kits of 4 x 8Gb are all about matching but 2 kits of 2 x 8Gb of the same make and model wouldn't be massively unmatched. I'd welcome suggestions for alternative brands too.

"Matching" RAM is more about marketing than anything else. In some rare cases you might get issues when mixing brands / speeds (but you really shouldn't - that's the fault of your mobo, not the RAM). "Mixing" RAM of the same type is just not an issue.

The term "Matching" doesn't actually mean much. The RAM running in this machine which has "matching" RAM has vastly different internal serial numbers and weeks of production, yet the stickers on the RAM are sequential for their serial numbers.

[Pob255]

Yes matching ram is fairly meaningless now, it dates back more to socket775 where you would be overclocking by fsb not just multiplier and all timings had to b the same.
These days ram speed and timings have very little effect and as intel is now overclockable by multiplier only it doesn't much matter, the big reason we generally suggest 1600mhz over 1333mhz is because it's normally cheaper not because it performs better.

[billd60]

Glad I found this thread as I am about to build a similar PC for the same reason. Currently running Win7 32bit and with Adobe Lightroom I occasionally get problems when exporting photos due to 'Out of memory'. Will stick with 16GB initially knowing I can then increase to 32GB if necessary without having to buy a 'matched' set!

[stilkun]

Glad I found this thread as I am about to build a similar PC for the same reason. Currently running Win7 32bit and with Adobe Lightroom I occasionally get problems when exporting photos due to 'Out of memory'. Will stick with 16GB initially knowing I can then increase to 32GB if necessary without having to buy a 'matched' set!

You will need to use Windows 7 64-bit if you are planning to add more RAM as 32-bit is limited to 4GB RAM.

[Agent]

Glad I found this thread as I am about to build a similar PC for the same reason. Currently running Win7 32bit and with Adobe Lightroom I occasionally get problems when exporting photos due to 'Out of memory'. Will stick with 16GB initially knowing I can then increase to 32GB if necessary without having to buy a 'matched' set!

You really need to move away from 32bit: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/libr...=vs.85%29.aspx