What makes KSP use RAM

[Laamapalmu]

Hello,

This has probably asked before, but I only found threads about x32 version. So I just installed about 2gb of mods for 0.24.2 clean installation, I launched the game in x64 version. The KSP folder is only about 3.2gb and KSP uses about 9-10gb of ram. What does the game exactly do to use ram more than 3 times the game folder size?

Thanks

KSP, first game I've played that uses over 5gb of ram

[Linear]

Storing every model upon load, every planet, every moon, every texture.

[Taki117]

The main RAM hog are Textures. If you have lots of High Res textures or lots of high part packs they will cause lots of RAM usage.

[Laamapalmu]

The textures are .png format right? If the windows folder properties calculates the textures too, I think it's kinda weird that textures would get bigger when the game loads, or is the game extracting files and are the textures packed?

[cantab]

Yeah, models and textures, and therefore parts mods.

Possibly some of the files are compressed on disc and then the data's stored uncompressed in RAM, that would explain the discrepancy. As would duplication of data for any reason.

[ratchet freak]

textures are unpacked in memory resulting in each pixel using a 32 bit value at best for a 512*512 texture that is 1MB plus metadata

[Pecan]

Computer files are, in general, instructions for a programme to do something. RAM is where the programme does it. There is no necessary connection between the size of the instructions and amount of RAM it occupies.

"Prepare 2 tonnes of concrete" <-- An instruction that doesn't mass as much as its result ^^.

"Initialise a block of memory for 256^3 integer values" <-- An instruction that doesn't take as much RAM as its result.