How much performance difference 1 gig ram vs 4 gig ram?

  • Thread starter Thread starter James
  • Start date Start date
It was an interesting time because microprocessors were cheap enough to
make some form of 'home computer' feasible but folks were still trying to
answer the question of what the heck could you use one for? As well as the
question of how to make the 'mystery box' usable by the average Jack and
Jill.
Click to expand...
Very true. Plus it was a great way to learn how to program. I started
programming Z80 assembler and even delighted in knowing that my CPU had some
undocumented instructions!

When I got to use a PC for the first time (a highly advanced 8MHz 80286 with
640K RAM, no hard drive, 2 5.25" floppies and CGA graphics), I didn't like
not knowing what went on behind the scenes. Even had to start delving into
the weirdness of Windows programming.

Eventually, I got the picture as it were and then ended up back where I
started - programming assembler for a derivative of the Z80 (i.e., all
Intel's processors). When I realized how similar the instructions were, it
felt very comfortable. (My best friend was a 6502 die-hard and had a
Microtan 65 - I have no idea if he ever did anything with it. Sort of a PC
vs Mac thing.)

One thing "useful" I did do with a ZX Spectrum was create the "Joy Drum". I
had a joystick and a "soundcard" based on the venerable AY-3-8910 chip. I
set it up so that each axis of the joystick triggered a different
"percussion" sound. This ended up on a rather silly recording I made with
some friends about the teachers in our school.

Oh, and with a ZX80, you could fry an egg....

John.
 
John said:
Very true. Plus it was a great way to learn how to program. I started
programming Z80 assembler and even delighted in knowing that my CPU had some
undocumented instructions!

When I got to use a PC for the first time (a highly advanced 8MHz 80286 with
640K RAM, no hard drive, 2 5.25" floppies and CGA graphics), I didn't like
not knowing what went on behind the scenes. Even had to start delving into
the weirdness of Windows programming.

Eventually, I got the picture as it were and then ended up back where I
started - programming assembler for a derivative of the Z80 (i.e., all
Intel's processors). When I realized how similar the instructions were, it
felt very comfortable. (My best friend was a 6502 die-hard and had a
Microtan 65 - I have no idea if he ever did anything with it. Sort of a PC
vs Mac thing.)

One thing "useful" I did do with a ZX Spectrum was create the "Joy Drum". I
had a joystick and a "soundcard" based on the venerable AY-3-8910 chip. I
set it up so that each axis of the joystick triggered a different
"percussion" sound. This ended up on a rather silly recording I made with
some friends about the teachers in our school.
Click to expand...

I was going to write an 'action' game for it till I discovered it blanked
the screen while a program was running. Made it dern hard to see where the
little fellers were going in the dark, and then they froze when the lights
came on.
Oh, and with a ZX80, you could fry an egg....
Click to expand...

LOL. Hadn't heard that one but it sounds like the most useful thing they
ever did. Sorry I missed it ;)
 
David Maynard said:
John Miller wrote:
I was going to write an 'action' game for it till I discovered it blanked
the screen while a program was running. Made it dern hard to see where the
little fellers were going in the dark, and then they froze when the lights
came on.


LOL. Hadn't heard that one but it sounds like the most useful thing they
ever did. Sorry I missed it ;)
Click to expand...

Exactly - the Z80 processor was also the display driver. The display was
only updated if nothing else was happening. Remember every key press (and I
use the term key loosely), caused the display to bounce?

In early 1981 at the Practical Computing exhibition in London, you could pay
one pound for a one-page program (on paper, of course) that you could
*carefully* type in - lots of weird REM statements - and you ended up with
flicker-free space invaders. That was amazing. And all in 1K of RAM
including the program and video display! Certainly beat "Cheese Nibbler" -
the game in the manual.

After all that typing in, you could save the program to cassette. BUT -
usually I had to turn my little black and white TV off otherwise it would
interfere with the tape recording. So, I had a little AM radio that I would
turn on during saving/loading in order to hear what was happening! And
people moan about plug and play!
 
In early 1981 at the Practical Computing exhibition in London,
Click to expand...

Yeah, with teh ZX81 I remember the graphics being rather clunky, but then a
14 year old buy discovered that with a bit of machine-code you could gte
much finer graphics. That certainly made the ZX81 look better with games.
Funny that a 14 year old had to find this out :-)

On-topic: any tried to edit with a ZX81? Probably would only be useful
nowadays as time-code convertor or something like that.

cheers

-martin-
 
Martin said:
On-topic: any tried to edit with a ZX81? Probably would only be
useful nowadays as time-code convertor or something like that.
Click to expand...

If someone had the need or desire for such a thing, I think it should be
technically feasible to utilize just about any old 8-bitter - be that a
ZX81, C64, or an Atari - as a LANC edit controller.

That kind of application would, of course, require a LANC bus adapter
(or two) for the old computer (supposedly plugged into a free cartridge
slot, an expansion port or some such), but building one shouldn't be too
challenging. After all, there are LANC adapter cables for PCs that plug
into a parallel printer (LPT) port and often consist of nothing more
than just a few simple discrete components -sometimes just a single
transistor!

With modern Firewire-equipped DV or D8 camcorders (those which also have
a LANC connector), editing would even be all-digital. The old computer
does not need to understand anything about the high-bandwidth sound and
video data flowing via the Firewire bus between the camcorders; it just
controls the tape transports and receives timecodes via the LANC port.

Then again, the days of linear deck-to-deck editing are pretty much over
by now - at least in the usual hobbyist sense. You would need to come up
with some special scenario where the modern non-linear editors just
don't do the trick for you to justify building the adapters and writing
your own linear editing software for a machine that most people would
consider obsolete.
 
If someone had the need or desire for such a thing, I think it should be
technically feasible to utilize just about any old 8-bitter - be that a
ZX81, C64, or an Atari - as a LANC edit controller.
Click to expand...

A PIC would do the trick :-) And better and cheaper, and no need to load
the program again via tape.
After all, there are LANC adapter cables for PCs that plug
into a parallel printer (LPT) port and often consist of nothing more
than just a few simple discrete components -sometimes just a single
transistor!
Click to expand...

By default the ZX81 didn't have a printer-port, but I think you needed to
hook it up to a docking station. Or was that the Spectrum?
With modern Firewire-equipped DV or D8 camcorders (those which also have
a LANC connector), editing would even be all-digital. The old computer
does not need to understand anything about the high-bandwidth sound and
video data flowing via the Firewire bus between the camcorders; it just
controls the tape transports and receives timecodes via the LANC port.
Click to expand...

Isn't the speed at LANC 9600 baud? Otherwise one could use the audio-ports
to which the cassette-player was attached.
Then again, the days of linear deck-to-deck editing are pretty much over
by now - at least in the usual hobbyist sense. You would need to come up
with some special scenario where the modern non-linear editors just
don't do the trick for you to justify building the adapters and writing
your own linear editing software for a machine that most people would
consider obsolete.
Click to expand...

True. But it would be a fun hobby-project for someone with a lot of time,
and no idea what to do.

-m-
 
Martin Heffels said:
A PIC would do the trick :-) And better and cheaper, and no need to load
the program again via tape.
Click to expand...

You could record the program onto your video so that in order to run the
program, you have to play the video first! (Not a serious suggestion,
obviously)

By default the ZX81 didn't have a printer-port, but I think you needed to
hook it up to a docking station. Or was that the Spectrum?
Click to expand...

The ZX80, ZX81 and Spectrum all had the edge connector so you could connect
the highly-advanced ZX Printer (that used thermally-sensitive
aluminium-coated toilet paper). I took my to bits (like a lot of things)
and it is quite a clever design...Wonder if the vaporised aluminium oxide
has caused Alzheimer's for anyone? - Clive seemed to be affect by something
when he launched the C5.

The ZX Spectrum had the ZX Interface 1 and ZX Interface 2 to allow parallel
devices, ZX Microdrives and other things to be attached.

I prefered the perilous uncertainty of the edge connector - so much as
sneeze and the computer would crash. Yep - Clive beat Bill on that count.
True. But it would be a fun hobby-project for someone with a lot of time,
and no idea what to do.
Click to expand...

"No idea what to do" - the best bit!
"I'm full of dust and guitars." - Syd Barrett
07/07/06 The Crazy Diamond is now a star in heaven
Click to expand...

Indeed. (Another Cambridge genius).
 
Just scored a computer with a Soyo SY-P4I865PE Dragon 2 V1.0 mobo, which
holds up to 4 gigs of DDR 400 ram.

Any thoughts/opinions on this mobo?
Click to expand...
Not that familiar with the mobo. As for RAM, video editing
applications need a bare minimum of 1GB of RAM. But, with only 1GB
you'll run into bottlenecks that can slow performance. We recommend
you get 2GB of RAM for you video editing computer.

Here is a link to our recommeded systems page. we offer you advice on
what you need for the best results.
http://www.videoguys.com/system.htm

For even more in depth information check out our DIY articles. You'll
find links to them on the page I provided above.

Gary
Videoguys.com

Videoguys.com http://www.videoguys.com
The Digital Video Editing & DVD Production Experts
800 323-2325 or Free DTV tech advice (516) 759-1615

All DTV purchases include our 30 day customer assurance program
and FREE tech support
 
James said:
Just scored a computer with a Soyo SY-P4I865PE Dragon 2 V1.0 mobo, which
holds up to 4 gigs of DDR 400 ram. Primarily play to use it for video
capture/DVD rendering. How much of a performance difference am I going to
see with say 1 gig ram vs the full 4 gigs? I imagine where the main point
of concern would be in rendering.

Any thoughts/opinions on this mobo?
Click to expand...

Put in a pair of 1 GB sticks. A dual or dual-core CPU may actually use more
than 1 GB a significant amount of time. Otherwise, a single CPU will not
effectively use (i.e., render a perceptible performance increase) more than 1 GB
very often.
 
I find the claim that 1GB is the minimum quite laughable.

As I type, I have Premiere Pro chugging away creating an MPEG2 file from two
DV AVI sources with titles and picture-in-picture. I am monitoring its
memory usage with Task Manager on a dual core Pentium D 2.8GHz with 1GB RAM.

CPU Use - 50% (kinda disappointing...maybe due to using a USB2.0 external
drive rather than Firewire)
Peak Mem Usage - 236,404K (i.e., 0.23GB)
Commit Charge (i.e, total mem use by all apps etc) - 469MB

Apps running: Premiere Pro, Outlook, Outlook Express plus a lot of services
etc.

So even a 512MB could cope without having to thrash to disk all the time
(especially if not running the other apps)

I'd like to see the claims for 2GB backed up with some hard numbers...

Any editing systems that require that much memory at a given time sound
rather suspect to me as far as quality of programming goes.

John.
 
Gary Bettan said:
James <[email protected]> wrote
Click to expand...
As for RAM, video editing applications need a bare minimum of 1GB of RAM.
Bullshit.

But, with only 1GB you'll run into bottlenecks that can slow performance.
We recommend you get 2GB of RAM for you video editing computer.
Click to expand...
Here is a link to our recommeded systems page. we
offer you advice on what you need for the best results.
http://www.videoguys.com/system.htm
Click to expand...
For even more in depth information check out our DIY articles.
You'll find links to them on the page I provided above.
Click to expand...
 
John Weiss said:
Put in a pair of 1 GB sticks. A dual or dual-core CPU may actually use
more than 1 GB a significant amount of time. Otherwise, a single CPU will
not effectively use (i.e., render a perceptible performance increase) more
than 1 GB very often.
Click to expand...

Show me - with hard numbers. My dualie with 1GB performs very well as per
my earlier reply to Gary Bettan - where I include hard numbers.

Save the money and use it for a faster CPU.....
 
It all depends on what your using your system for. YMMV

At work, we take a great deal of digital photos to document the conditions
of products we are testing (Automotive testing).

For years, or photographer has been using a system that has dual 550Mhz
Pentium III's, with 1gig of ram and SCSI hard drives. He uses Adobe
Photoshop 6.0 and is usually processing 20-30 photos at a time. All this is
running on Windows NT 4.0.

Photo's are typically 6-15meg each TIFF files.

A year ago, in an effort to help him out, we built him a newer system, this
time with a Pentium 4 2.8Ghz, 2gig ram, Raptor HD's, same Adobe Photoshop
6.0, Windows 2K pro.

We figured the additional horsepower and ram would make a big diference.

Nope.

He tried the new system for a while, then decided to say thanks, but no
thanks, and went right back to his Dual 550Mhz, 1gig, NT 4.0, scsi drives.
 
I agree.

Interestingly (to me, anyway!), I installed Adobe Premiere 4.2 recently
since I needed a true Video for Windows NLE to test something. Its GUI is
very fast compared to the current Premiere - much like Windows 3.1 flies on
a modern PC! Minimum RAM required for Prem 4.2 - 8MB, recommended 16MB....

For years, I used Premiere 4.2 with a luxurious 16MB and a couple of 100MB
hard drives for the video (not GB!)
 
That reminds me, of back in the day when using 286 cpu and trying to run
win3.1 fast, i tried the IBM Geo OS and it was so much faster with less
overhead. Unfortunetly it never caught on cause hardware got faster so
leaner more efficient OS software wasn't as important.
Today's software just keeps getting more and more bloated.

Take adobe reader for example. I didn't need any more features to read a pdf
file than the original version, yet they keep adding and adding to it, so
that it takes so much time now to load and just open to view a couple of
seconds of pdf using the web, and is constantly updating and rebooring when
you have the least amount of time to spare.
It's totally unacceptible how bloated software keeps becoming as soon as the
hardware finally can handle the current software well.

AnthonyR.
 
Back
Top