4gb or 8gb RAM or use Readyboost?

[Windows Central Question]

I am on the verge of buying a SP4 I5 and am not sure if I really need the 8gb Ram and thus the added expense of the higher price. The shop assistant advised possibly going for the 4gb at the lower price and using readyboost if I needed more RAM.

I had not heard of Readyboost before today (as you cant tell - I am a novice), the will it really work and if so will it be good enough to run the likes of Photoshop etc. I am not a designer but I do want to be able to enhance photos.

Thanks in advance

 

[TechFreak1]

Ready boost basically uses a USB thumb drive as a cache.

Apart from photoshop what else do you plan to do?

 

[realwarder]

Readyboost is not something to consider, especially if you have an SSD. For basic photo editing Photoshop will be fine in 4GB RAM.

Looks like there is a $300 difference between models, but you're also getting twice the SSD disk space as well as twice the RAM.

If you're not a designer and just want occasional editing, 4GB will be fine.

 

[xandros9]

You cannot use Readyboost.

Readyboost is a feature in Windows dating back to Vista I believe.
It uses a flash memory device plugged into your computer as a cache for the slower spinning hard drive with the end result of improving performance.

The Surface has an SSD as opposed to a traditional spinning hard drive of old and you will not be able to enable Readyboost because Windows recognizes there wont be much benefit.
(I've tried on my computer, which is similar to an i7 Pro 3 under the hood.)

I'd recommend 4 GB to mostly basic users. I think you'd appreciate the extra memory for dealing with heavy photo editing and such. But you'll probably get by fine on 4, unless there's heavier things like intense web browsing or gaming also on the table.

 

[Misterb]

The question is, will 4 gigs be enough 2 or 3 years from now?

 

[xandros9]

Well, considering minimum system requirements have hardly changed since Windows Vista nearly a decade ago... I'd wager yes, unless you expect to increase the work you throw at this computer significantly and do heavier things like virtual PCs.

 

[boltman2013]

Funny how people are brainwashed to think 4GB is not enough..seriously it is for 99% of users.

And for that 1% its $500 more

THINK.

 

[Grimmric]

Funny how people are brainwashed to think 4GB is not enough..seriously it is for 99% of users.

And for that 1% its $500 more

THINK.

You should not talk for everybody.
I have looked at som reviews and i saw that if you want to use the pen and a painting program they say that you shouldnt buy the m3 with 4GB ram.
Its good that you explain to people what you use it for and that it works good for you.
But i dont think 99% of the user are exacly like you.
If i would be ok to use a Surface 2, then i wouldnt go on this forum and say that nobody should buy a surface 4 as 99% dont need it and that they would be brainwashed from MS.

 

[boltman2013]

You should not talk for everybody.
I have looked at som reviews and i saw that if you want to use the pen and a painting program they say that you shouldnt buy the m3 with 4GB ram.
Its good that you explain to people what you use it for and that it works good for you.
But i dont think 99% of the user are exacly like you.
If i would be ok to use a Surface 2, then i wouldnt go on this forum and say that nobody should buy a surface 4 as 99% dont need it and that they would be brainwashed from MS.

Thats a straw man argument.... see the difference is immense in feature set alone going from Surface 2 to SP4 that the % who would benefit form a switch would be 100% (at everything else being equal) . However the move from an M3 to an i5/8GB is both a positive and negative equation especially when the extra $500 is factored in. Also remember the i5 picks up a fan , extra weight and worse 3d graphics.

So it is not stretching the facts that only about 1% were they given the chance to try both for an extended run would opt to spend the $500 and pick up the negative factors over the M3. Because the proof is in use. Unfortunately people must buy the M3 sight unseen. I have the luxery of using the i5 8GB version for about six hours straight while deciding and now own my M3. I can assure you the M3 keeps up with the i5 in the tasks that 99% of users will do (including painting) . Only under extreme loads that 1% of users will do would the i5 be better due to performance compensating for the huge negatives (Cost/Fan). So next time you try to rebut what I say bring facts not conjecture. I feel very comfortable putting my expertise out there for the community as I put in the time and the research. Plus I have deep knowledge of just about every Microsoft product ever made.

 

[Grimmric]

I am very happy that i read some reviews before i found this forum as i am the 1% that need the i5 or better.
So thank you boltman2013. I stand corrected.
I would be very sad if i bought a m3 before i read the reviews and regretted my choice.

 

[Eric J F]

I agree with Boltman2013. When I thought about it realistically, I realized 4GB was fine for my needs. Five hundred dollars is a lot to pay for a few rare situations (in my case, going from the m3 to i5). It's like buying a 4 wheel drive and not needing to take it off pavement.

The argument about future demands doesn't bother me. I buy a new device about every five years, since they start having problems about the time they're really obsolete.

 

[rocketboy]

I'm a professional user interface designer/coder and do personal digital art in my spare time. When I first started my job in 2013 I was given a Lenovo T430 with i5/4GB and Adobe CS6 Premium. I also put in Visual Studio for web development. I rarely had an issue with 4GB RAM. When I did it was under the condition of running Photoshop, Firefox, Chrome, IE, Outlook, Visual Studio, and probably a bunch of corporate background stuff together. In that stack of things, it was the three browsers (especially Firefox) that ate the most memory. And I can't even remember what these "issue" times really even involved. Maybe a bit of swap delay.

I can say that when I absolutely have hit a 4GB ceiling was during development running Visual Studio, full IIS, a SQL Server instance, browsers, and a few bits of productivity software at once. That was 6 years ago on a large development project. You can also do it if you're running one or more virtual machines. So you can absolutely max out 4GB, but it's not under what I would consider normal usage situations.

I went with the i5/4GB for my SP4 choice to get the power but never seriously considered upgrading to 8GB. Chances are in 2 years there'll be a SP5 or SP6 which I'll be interested in so by my thinking I really need to be stopped dead in my work without 8GB to justify the cost. That just doesn't happen for me.

However, the SP4 is also my secondary machine. My desktop has 8GB and dedicated graphics so if I need to do a really big job I have a fall back. YMMV if you are using the SP4 as your only machine. Honestly, going back to my desktop happens more for the ergonomics of having a much bigger screen than power/RAM.

 

[zkyevolved]

I use my SP4 in a professional environment:
Editing documents
Adobe Fireworks
Editing some code here and there
Managing a few other machines via remote desktop and SSH

4GB is more than enough for me, I had it on my SP2 and I have it on my SP4. What I did do though use my micro sd card for extra space. I have that for all the videos and silly files that get synced over via Bittorrent Sync.

My RAM usage is always above 50% but always under 80%. I play some light games on my SP4 as well, but I can't say what my RAM usage is. But I haven't had any problems as of yet. I'd say go for the SP4. If you have the cash to burn through then go for the more expensive device. I personally didn't because it isn't my primary computer. It's just a "laptop" for me, an extension of my desktop. It's a very good extension, but lacking a few TB that my desktop and server has, but that's ok, because I mapped the network drives and I have selective sync via bittorrent sync. All is good for the moment!