Max usable RAM?

[Tyko]

I'm upgrading from 16GB of RAM and want to make sure KSP has lots of elbow room. Where is the point of diminishing returns? I realize processor / graphics card also plays a role, but if RAM is the weak link, will 32 help? will 64 help any more?

[AlmostNASA]

I don't know do you have an SSD?

I use a 128Gig Sandisk SSD with 8 gigs of RAM. Also an NVIDIA 740 Overclocked and my game is smooth and fast as heck. with and old (ancient) Intel processor which is a duo-core.

 

Edited July 19, 2016 by AlmostNASA

[Tyko]

Yes, I have an SSD. I'm asking about RAM specifically because I'm running 75 Mods with tons of extra parts. Since all those textures are living in RAM....

[AlmostNASA]

I am using RO with a whole ton of mods (too many to count) but your computer and mine should be the same so possibly upgrade your SSD of Graphics card

 

[Tyko]

With all due respect, I asked a specific technical question about whether there were benefits of increasing RAM beyond 16GB. You're offering troubleshooting advice with no idea what my hardware setup is or what problem I'm trying to solve...you said your hardware and mine should be the same...how the heck do you know that?

Edited July 20, 2016 by tjt

[radonek]

Two ways:

1. since most of KSP data are media assets, size of installation on disk should correspond to worst-case memory requirements. Note I didnt said "equals", since this is VERY rough estimate (some data may not be loaded in memory, others may be stored compressed).
2. since KSP load all assets on startup, just fire up the game and look what it takes. Again, this is not precise since code may obviously allocate more memory while running.

My very own slightly moded KSP installation weighs 2.8GB and takes 2.4GB RSS, which is close enough to give it credit. So my estimate would be "something under 3G".

Note that both of these are not established measurement methods, but creative misuse of known and special facts about KSP - that most of its memory are media assets that are pulled on start and remain constant. Most of the time art of memory measurement is not that easy, only way to be sure is to have unburdened system, tune down kernel swappiness, release every memory pressure you can think off (disk caches, DMA buffers, running daemons…), then fire it up and see if it comes through ceiling. Outside of laboratory conditions, I'd say that if you have lots of allocable memory, that is, free pages or pages that can be freed by kernel when needed (disk cache), you are good. (This is more complicated on windows since its kernel like to push pages to swap left and right, but more memory wont help with that anyway.)

BTW all of above assumes that you can actually make use of all your memory (read: have 64bit system) have no memory leaks (no amount of memory will help you there) or mods that alter memory management. Just throwing hardware at unknown, like some other people here would have is, lets say, very kerbal way of doing things :-)

[jarhead1145]

16Gb of ram is fine, KSP probably would crash from instability if it used close to that amount of ram.

[rudi1291]

Looks like KSP can only use a maximum of 16GB anyway due to a Unity problem: http://bugs.kerbalspaceprogram.com/issues/8422

[Tyko]

Great! Thanks for taking the time to answer

[jarhead1145]

tjt if you are looking for the computer component that'll make or break ksp's performance look for a CPU with great single core performance like intel's latest i5 or i7. I don't know much about AMD so I'll leave that advice to someone else. I don't think ksp requires a top of the line gpu like a gtx 1080, but a gtx 970 or 960 would do fine I think.

[Liquid]

RAM is not going to be the weak link.

As radonek advised, check the size of your KSP directory on disk and it's RAM usage will be less than that. Even with 75 mods it's probably not even near 8GB, let alone 16. I wouldn't bother upgrading the RAM, 16GB is huge and you'd be very unlikely to see any benefit from upgrading.

[Alshain]

I concur, you will be hard pressed to fill 16GB whether KSP supports it or not, really even 8 is a lot unless you are running several instances for some reason.  CPU will almost always be the weakest link in KSP now that we have 64-bit support.

[Tyko]

My game is honestly running pretty smoothly, I'm just fairly invested in hardware and expect it to work . Occasionally it "pauses" for a second. Everything stops for a second and then it picks right back up again.

• I've got (I think) a rock solid processor: 3.46GHz 6-Core 'Westmere' (Intel X3690, 6-Cores, QPI: 6.4GT/s
• My Graphics card isn't brand new, but I have yet to run across a game that it can't handle. I'm playing Fallout 4 at nearly max settings:
  • EVGA GeForce GTX 680 Classified 4GB 256-Bit GDDR5 PCI Express 3.0 x16 Dual DVI/ HDMI/ DisplayPort/ HDCP Ready/ SLI Support Video Graphics Card Mfr P/N 04G-P4-3688-KR

Given that setup, I'm a bit confused over why I'm getting any probs...that's why I was looking at RAM.

[John FX]

the pause is garbage collection, it`s being worked on for a future update. It`s mainly a Unity issue but there are things being looked at.

I would say to expect your KSP game to use upwards of 10Gb of your RAM when you load it up.

[Peder]

.delete

Edited July 20, 2016 by Peder

[radonek]

I've just recently encountered stuttering after installing PreciseNode mod. Deleted it and stutter went away. If its problem with unity (or, more likely, bundled mono runtime) apparently it can be worked around, since I have lots of other mods. Moral of the story is: install new mods one at a time.
 

[Tyko]

20 hours ago, John FX said:

the pause is garbage collection, it`s being worked on for a future update. It`s mainly a Unity issue but there are things being looked at.

I would say to expect your KSP game to use upwards of 10Gb of your RAM when you load it up.

Thanks for the explanation. That would also explain why my game is silky smooth except for those pauses. It also means that I don't have to drop cash on new hardware ( A mixed blessing because upgrading is fun, but extra cash is also fun)

[John FX]

3 hours ago, tjt said:

Thanks for the explanation. That would also explain why my game is silky smooth except for those pauses. It also means that I don't have to drop cash on new hardware ( A mixed blessing because upgrading is fun, but extra cash is also fun)

There seems to be a whole load of code revision to reduce garbage going on right now. I`ll be curious to see how well they do.

[sarbian]

On 20/07/2016 at 7:37 PM, jarhead1145 said:

16Gb of ram is fine, KSP probably would crash from instability if it used close to that amount of ram.

 

On 20/07/2016 at 7:43 PM, rudi1291 said:

Looks like KSP can only use a maximum of 16GB anyway due to a Unity problem: http://bugs.kerbalspaceprogram.com/issues/8422

 

The bug is Linux only. I tested KSP with a 28GB memory use without any problems on Windows.