Benefit of upgrading from 64gb to 256gb of RAM?

[K. Rixon]

As more and more work has been coming my way, I've been upgrading my workstation, which I use primarily for Resolve (Editing/Coloring) with some motion graphics work in After Effects (only because my fusion proficiency is weak and clients keep sending me AE project files). My personal camera is a Komodo, but I regularly edit/color footage from 8k dsmc2, Arri RAW, cDNG, etc. My relevant system specs are below, but my question is: Would I benefit (in a noticeable way) in upgrading from 64gb of RAM to 256gb?

System Specs:

Processor: AMD TR 3960x
Memory: 64gb DDR4 3000mhz (c15)
Motherboard: ASUS ROG Zenith Extreme Alpha II
GPU: ASUS 3090Ti TUF
OS Drive: 1TB 980 nvme
Programs: 1TB 980 nvme
Media: 2x2tb 980 nvme Raid
Cache: 1TB 970 nvme

Thanks for any insight.

 

[Karim D. Ghantous]

I don't work with video files at all. But, I can suggest that if you are currently coping well with everything that you are being given, maybe you don't need more RAM. SSDs have made RAM slightly less important.

OTOH, Phil Holland just built a new workstation, and he has an ungodly amount of RAM in that thing.

https://www.phfx.com/articles/workstationAndWorkflow2022/

 

[K. Rixon]

I don't work with video files at all. But, I can suggest that if you are currently coping well with everything that you are being given, maybe you don't need more RAM. SSDs have made RAM slightly less important.

OTOH, Phil Holland just built a new workstation, and he has an ungodly amount of RAM in that thing.

https://www.phfx.com/articles/workstationAndWorkflow2022/

Thanks for the response. I generally try to refrain from hardware upgrades until it needs to be done. I should have mentioned in my original post that my normal work deliverables average 2-3 minutes. However, this summer I will be cutting and grading a 40+ minute doc shot on Mini LF/Inspire 2 cDNG. I'd like to make sure I won't be bottlenecking myself.

And Phil's rigs/workstations continue to be the envy of all. I'd love to know what his ram usage looks like on a given workflow.

 

[Michael Lindsay]

not sure my experience helps at all...

I have a lots of Ram in my HP Z8 workstation as it was architecturally important to getting both the CPU's working at full speed... However I never saw Ram usage rise very much above 20% usage as it was a pipeline issue not an amount issue ... I basically had to populate the right amount of slots... also now that r3ds completely decode on GPU I reckon the ram is of no use at all... GPU memory on the other hand is important and this pushed me to upgrade my GX cards recently..

 

[Alex Lubensky]

When I was building my workstation back in 2011 the general rule was - put AT LEAST 4gb of RAM per CPU CORE. So I went with 32GB on a 6-core system (12 threads). Never had an issue or a hickup. RAM memory is what gives your system stability not to crash.

 

[Alex Lubensky]

You can see how much of a RAM does your system utilize by going into the system resource monitor. If it doesn't go higher than 60% of your current setup - no need to buy more. Be sure to check on a highly loaded project.

To me it's more up to video card RAM in Resolve, not CPU RAM nowadays (after Resolve 15)