Limitations with 8GB RAM?

[TriValleyScott]

Hi, I'm new here. Until now, I've been using Pro Tools M-Powered 8, and I'm currently enrolled in a Pro Tools 110 class.

Background:I plan to run Pro Tools 10 on a new Mac Book Pro. The price difference between a machine with 8GB vs 16GB of RAM was about $700. I figured I'd buy the one with 8GB, upgrade it, and have money left over.

Literally mere minutes after placing my order for a 15.4" Retina Display 2.6GHz Quad Core computer with 8GB of RAM, a Mac expert friend called to advise that I cannot upgrade the RAM to 16GB in the Retina Display models because the chips are soldered to the motherboard, not a removable unit like other Mac Book Pros. I need to decide whether to cancel the order and upgrade to a machine with 16GB RAM already installed, or live with the 8GB.

Primary use: Live recording up to 24 channels at once (few or no plug-ins running), then later mixing (probably many plug-ins running).

My Question: How much will having only 8GB of RAM limit what I can do when mixing?

I'm appreciative for any first-hand experience with RAM limitations.

Thanks,

Scott

[Craig F]

with plain 10 you should are fine, it can only access >4GB
11 will be able to access all of it

long run if you want to get into sample based VIs you should top out the RAM

[TriValleyScott]

Craig, thanks for your input. I'll get the machine I ordered and I won't panic.

Scott

[bashville]

Originally Posted by TriValleyScott

Craig, thanks for your input. I'll get the machine I ordered and I won't panic.

Scott

Sorry if I'm late with this, but I definitely had a bad experience with only 8 Gig, even with the 32 bit 4 Gig limitation. RAM is not always efficiently managed by the various softwares you might be running on your machine at any time. You'll find yourself hitting the limit when apps don't properly "release" the RAM they should be using. I had a Retina that I needed to get in a hurry, and they only had the 8 gig machine. They're great computers, but I kept hitting the RAM limit, unless I religiously ran a music-only system with no other apps running. I'm back into a MacPro at the moment with 16 Gig. I think I wouldn't have had to trade back if the Retina had been the 16 Gig model.

[bashville]

Particularly if you're going to use a lot of VI's, there are a lot of other schemes they use to get around the 4 gig limit, like processes external to PT. (Or Vienna Ensemble Pro, which takes everything out of the program). Once you add those to your total used, you can start hitting that limit.

IF you're primarily dealing in audio, with a minimum of midi-work, you might be OK.

[Bill Denton]

Today is Thursday, tomorrow will be Friday and the landscape will be quite a bit different. And when Pro Tools 11 ships it will have changed even more.

And by the end of summer you'll be kicking yourself for having not bought the 16 GB model.

There's an old axiom that work expands to fill the time allotted for it.

There's a newer axiom...computer programs expand to fill all available memory. It's been that way since we only had 16 KB, it will be that way when we have 1024 TB.

Remember that whatever RAM you buy today is all you will ever have in the machine you buy today; you can't upgrade it.

Buy the 16 GB...you'll be glad you did...

[musicman691]

Originally Posted by TriValleyScott

Hi, I'm new here. Until now, I've been using Pro Tools M-Powered 8, and I'm currently enrolled in a Pro Tools 110 class.

Background:I plan to run Pro Tools 10 on a new Mac Book Pro. The price difference between a machine with 8GB vs 16GB of RAM was about $700. I figured I'd buy the one with 8GB, upgrade it, and have money left over.

Literally mere minutes after placing my order for a 15.4" Retina Display 2.6GHz Quad Core computer with 8GB of RAM, a Mac expert friend called to advise that I cannot upgrade the RAM to 16GB in the Retina Display models because the chips are soldered to the motherboard, not a removable unit like other Mac Book Pros. I need to decide whether to cancel the order and upgrade to a machine with 16GB RAM already installed, or live with the 8GB.

Primary use: Live recording up to 24 channels at once (few or no plug-ins running), then later mixing (probably many plug-ins running).

My Question: How much will having only 8GB of RAM limit what I can do when mixing?

I'm appreciative for any first-hand experience with RAM limitations.

Thanks,

Scott

Cancel the Retina model and get a non-Retina version where you can upgrade the memory yourself. You'll save a TON of money. And remember to never buy Apple ram. You'll save even more money.

[smfelton]

Originally Posted by musicman691

Cancel the Retina model and get a non-Retina version where you can upgrade the memory yourself. You'll save a TON of money. And remember to never buy Apple ram. You'll save even more money.

Get your memory from crucial if you can, cant go wrong....

[roberts]

if your serious about doing work why are you using a laptop?
- a dual processor Mac Pro with 64 GB of RAM is going to crush a Laptop when PT 11 comes out.

[guatamas]

Like everyone is saying, go for the 16GB version

My 2 cents... I had 8GB on my PC then maxed it out to 16GB of corsair... very quickly I noticed a difference with Pro Tools but most importantly overall improved system performance. Granted PT 10 is still 32 bit app, I still profited from the upgrade. Do it!!