More Memory=Better Performance?

[Bruce Kanzelmeyer]

Has anyone determined that Mastercam works better/faster with 4 gigs of RAM vs. 2 gigs RAM? In other words, is it worthwhile to upgrade to WIN X64 to allow access to more memory?

[Jaz]

XP64 and/or extra memory appears to have little if any affect on MC performance UNLESS you need to run other processor and memory intensive applications at the same time.

[bogusmill]

Probably not. I had XP 64bit for 9 months and it seemed to crash less often but it didn't run the benchmarks any faster. The biggest increase has been found to be cache size on the CPU.

[MLS]

/hijack

 

Hey bogusmill, did you get my e-mail? We have been having "issues" with it lately.

 

/hijack off

[Bruce Kanzelmeyer]

Bogusmill,

 

We are just getting the components together to build a new MC workstation and we're starting with the new ASUS Rampage Extreme board and the Q9550 processor. We've ordered a couple of sticks of Patriot DDR3 (2 x 1 gig) (PC3 16000) but now I'm having 2nd thoughts about whether this will really be a speed advantage--I guess we'll just have to wait and see at this point! I'll keep everyone posted.

[FP1]

With only mastercam running I went from 1 GB to 3GB of ram and the benchmark test was not any faster.

[Kelly Burns]

MCam in my opinion is more processor driven than memory. Faster processor = Faster toolpaths being built. 4 Gig of Ram here, doesnt do anything quicker than with 2 Gig. Dual processor is good though when working with multiple files. Ex. programming large molds, e-mail, excell, Firefox, and all the other stuff we use daily. Otherwise your box is locked untill the toolpaths regen. This is a big selling point to the check writers when trying to upgrade. The benchmark tests kind of confirm this. I use a Dell straight from the factory with 1 step down on the "best" video card, and dual CPU. 10 K drive is a nice feature to keep stuff local and off the network untill done with it. You guys building boxes up are just banging your heads; Its fun to do untill you have problems and need tech support to fix it. Sounds more like a PITA to me. Just my opinion; dont mean to hurt anyones feelings.

[Guest]

I agree with bogus,

 

with at least 2 gigs system RAM, the next best thing that WILL increase speed is L2 cache(on chip), if you can get a 12meg(2 x 6meg) chip, especially with a 1333 FSB, those there contribute to the biggest gains at the moment.

 

We tested a 2.67 Ghz CPU with a 1333FSB and 12 meg cache, it was faster than a 3.0 Ghz with a 1066 FSB and 6 meg cache.

[Bruce Kanzelmeyer]

John,

 

Do you find any advantages to running Vista? We're running XP SP3 but my old box seems to crash MC quite a bit. Also, do you have MC temp and regen files, along with Windows page file on one of your raptors, with programs and op system and everything else on the other? Thanks to all for your feedback.

[Guest]

Bruce,

 

Advantages, there is not real advantage to running Mastercam. I do however like the look or Vista. I have not had a single OS issue and MCAM has only crashed a handful of times.

 

My drives are setup in a RAID 0 format, so it is set for striping.

 

With the x64 platform I do have access to all of my 4 gigs, I may bump up to 8 gigs over the next week as well.

 

My laptop at work has really started to behave strangely with XP SP3 in recent weeks.

[Dracbus]

I recently upgraded from 2 gigs to 4 gigs and sadly saw no increase in speed with the benchmark. It seems processor speed is much more important. I have 2 comps with xeon processors and one that is not a xeon and the xeons run almost twice as fast for MC.

[iowajim62]

John,

quote:

---

With the x64 platform I do have access to all of my 4 gigs, I may bump up to 8 gigs over the next week as well.

---

have you checked out ready boost ?

Vista Ready Boost

[iowajim62]

bump