Adding RAM slows Render?

[Richard Sanchez]

Your render speed is going to be more dependent on your processors than on your ram. However, if your ram is configured incorrectly, it can cause issues. Did you add 12GB to your exisiting 4GB, or did you add ram to a total of 12GB. I’m currently running a total of 12 GB. 2 2Gb modules in slot 1 and 2, and 2 1 Gb modules in slot 3 and 4, respectively on both risers. You want your larger modules on the inner slots.

Richard Sanchez
North Hollywood, CA

“We are the facilitators of our own creative evolution.” – Bill Hicks

[Mark Maness]

Well, let me add this…

Most everyone thinks they can just add memory to you machine and everything will be great.

Not so…

FCP has special requirements that even the fine folks at Apple aren’t very aware of. You have to add matching pairs of memory across the risers (A and B) in a special order AND FCP needs the memory to be in multiples of 4, meaning, 2 gig, 4 gig, 8 gig, 16 gig or 32 gig. Anything else will and can cause weird issues such as yours.

Let me explain the memory placement a little better. If you have 2 2gig bars in riser A, then you need to install 2 2gig bars in riser B. And you do this until you get all your memory installed.

Let me make my point. Remove the original 4 gig of memory. now install your memory that you added in risers A and B in the order I explained. Now, restart your machine and see how it works. I would bet that your renders will be faster.

Give it a shot.

_______________________________

Wayne Carey
Schazam Productions
https://web.mac.com/schazamproductions
schazamproductions@mac.com

[Mitch Jordan]

Thanks for your help. The computer originally came with 2gb of RAM, 1 gb on the top riser and 1 on the bottom, I believe. I ordered the 4gb from OWC, and replaced the original 2gb. Now, I’ve added 12 more- 6 2gb sticks. So, all 8 slots are filled with the same 2gb sticks from OWC.

[Mark Maness]

Ok…

Take out 4 gig of RAM. Leaving you a total of 8 gig. See how that works.

Oh, one more thing. Is all of this RAM exactly the specs?

_______________________________

Wayne Carey
Schazam Productions
https://web.mac.com/schazamproductions
schazamproductions@mac.com

[Mitch Jordan]

I’ll try taking out 4gb. All the sticks should be identical.

[Chris Borjis]

it might still be an issue if they were made at different times.

the best advice is to only upgrade memory all at once ensuring
its all the same and not mixing it with any other memory.

[Mitch Jordan]

I’ve tried it after taking the 4gb of RAM out. I tried moving that 4gb to the DIMM 4 slot on both risers (1 stick on each). The render times don’t change much.

[Todd Sansom]

i’m not claiming to know everything or even much of anything, but reading through these posts it becomes very clear no one really knows. there are a lot of good ideas for possible solutions. i was on the phone for 3 hours with different companies including apple and none of them were really sure either.

not reading into it too much one would assume final cut doesn’t use more than 4gb ram (https://www.apple.com/finalcutstudio/specs/). That said, your computer could always use a little more for doing other processes. Safest bet, fill your ram plates with 2gb sticks. with 8 slots that will give your computer a large 16bg of ram, so you can run fcp, apurture, dvdsp and even a little motion if you wanted. filling every slot with 2gb chips takes care of all the unknowns of every person on here.

so where do you buy ram. apple says they make the best ram and that’s why 2 x 2gb sticks are $950±. OWC (macsales.com) you can get (depending on your machine) 16gb for $600. apple says their 4 gb is better than owc’s 16 gb. bias…i don’t know.

one thing that will definately help your fcp performance is a better gpu (video card). the higher the ddr the better the card.

apple offers this card as a new upgrade (https://www.amd.com/us/products/desktop/graphics/ati-radeon-hd-4000/hd-4870/Pages/ati-radeon-hd-4870-overview.aspx). it screams. we are putting one in one of our mac pro editing stations. people also like (https://eshop.macsales.com/item/ATI%20Technologies/100435928/) and they also like (https://ati.amd.com/products/RADEONX1900/index.html)

so the long and short of it is keep it simple on the ram and get a good gpu. if you can’t afford $4,000 for apple ram then buy the stuff from owc, it won’t kill you. just keep it simple and spend the $600 and put the same kind, from the same time period and the same specs in every slot and you avoid all of the guess work everyone has been offering on this thread.

Todd Sansom
Cinematographer .:. Editor