How To Allocate More RAM to Speed Up Programs on Your Computer?

How to Allocate More Ram?  When buying a laptop, a phone, or a desktop, the first thing most people check for is RAM (random access memory). This is because your computer’s performance heavily depends on RAM. It is your computer’s short-term data storage, therefore the information that you are using while working on your device is stored in RAM. The more programs you are running on your device, the more memory you will need. If you have several programs running on your computer at the same time, you might run of space on RAM. This significantly slows down your computer. The question here would be how to allocate more RAM to a program to make it function faster.

Every software that runs on your computer needs a minimum amount of space so that it can function properly. Since most people have multiple software running on their system, sometimes the computer might not have enough RAM to support all the software. This is especially true for computers with 4GB RAM. To an extent, even computers with 8GB RAM can give you trouble in case your workload is heavy. If there is not enough room on your RAM, the software you are trying to run may not work at all.

How to Keep Track of Programs that Your Computer is Running?

Keeping track of the programs you are running on the computer can help you determine which program is using the most RAM. When using a Windows computer, you can check the list of programs that are running by going to the Windows task manager located in the windows system menu from the start option. Windows Task Manager indicates the names of programs you are running and the corresponding resources they are consuming.

How to Allocate More RAM?

Some programs need more RAM to function smoothly compared to other programs. For eg: gaming on your computer needs significantly more RAM compared to when you are browsing on your computer. If you are engaged in activities that consume a lot of your memory space, then you can prioritize your memory and allocate more RAM to programs that need higher memory space like your game applications. You can also choose to control and limit the memory consumption of background applications.

However, it is much easier to have a look at the programs you are running and closing whatever is not being used to free up RAM space. You can run Windows memory diagnostic tool to know how much RAM space you have left for use.

How to Use the Windows Memory Diagnostic Tool?

Here is how you can run a Windows Memory Diagnostic test.

1. Go to the start menu and click on Windows Administrative Tools. From the drop down menu select Windows Memory Diagnostic.
2. Choose restart now and check for problems option from the dialog box that appears. Make sure you save your work before running the diagnostic.
3. After the first restart, the diagnostic tool will test the memory. Wait for a few minutes for your computer to restart for a second time. After it restarts again you are good to use your computer.
4. In case you need to check the results of the diagnostic test that you just ran on your computer you can click on the notification that appears after your system restarts for the second time.
5. Alternatively, you can go to Windows Administrative Tools from the ‘Start’ menu. From the drop down options select event viewer.
6. Head to Windows logs and tap on System.
7. Search for ‘Find’ option on the right side of the page.

A dialog box will appear with a search box once you choose the ‘Find’ option.

Type in ‘MemoryDiagnostic’ in the search box and tap on find next.
The box that appears above will show the memory scan and the lower part of the page will indicate individual details. You can also double-tap on item for details.

How to Prioritize RAM for Specific Tasks?

Follow these steps to prioritize RAM usage to give more RAM space to the programs that need more memory to function smoothly.

1. Open task manager and search for the program you want to allocate more RAM
2. Right click on the program and click on ‘set priority’ option that appears on the menu.
3. Choose between the options; high, above normal, normal, below normal, and low.

If you want to give more RAM space to the chosen program select high.

Also, you can check the background applications and other programs running on your system and choose ‘low’ from the ‘set priority’ option. This can free up considerable RAM space which can be allocated to the programs that need heavy RAM space to function smoothly.

RAM can be referred to as the core of your computer. CPU and RAM work hand in hand to perform the daily tasks on your computer. Launching applications, designing using CAD software, playing graphic-intensive games, or watching an HD movie would require a significant amount of RAM space. Higher RAM space also allows you to quickly switch between these tasks. Therefore, the more memory you have the better.

These days 4GB RAM is inadequate as people are increasingly using their computers for a variety of tasks including everyday work and gaming. Therefore, at least a computer with 8 GB RAM is necessary to handle all the tasks efficiently. If you have to work on software like CAD to play a graphic intensive game like Call of Duty, you would need 16 GB RAM for your computer to run these programs uninterruptedly.

Choose your RAM space wisely depending on the tasks you plan to run on your computer. Hope this article has helped you understand how to allocate more RAM.

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