Awesome Tips Does Linux use less RAM?
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Games need more RAM, but prices are abysmal. Unfortunate, I know. But before you empty your wallet for an upgrade, what if the answer is switching to the penguin side? I ran two identical test benches in real-world workloads to find out if ditching Windows is the only memory upgrade you actually need.
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CHAPTERS
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0:00 Intro
1:29 Sponsor
1:50 Our Test
3:27 Browsing
4:53 Discord
5:27 Slay the Spire 2
6:54 Baldur’s Gate 3
9:45 Expedition 33
11:14 Conclusion
12:37 DeleteMe
13:33 Outro
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Unused RAM is wasted RAM. The problem is if this causes performance issues later.
Last week I switch from W11 to Bazzite. What sealed it for me was the revelation that Microsoft can track you through hardware IDs and are willing to give that information to the police. I don't have anything to hide, but I'm sick to death of being tracked, advertised to and suveilled.
All of a sudden people need to care about RAM usage. I remember people saying who cares about a few GB of RAM usage when RAM is about the cheapest upgrade you could do for a PC and has been for decades.
I'd just like to interject for a moment. What you're refering to as Linux, is in fact, GNU/Linux, or as I've recently taken to calling it, GNU plus Linux. Linux is not an operating system unto itself, but rather another free component of a fully functioning GNU system made useful by the GNU corelibs, shell utilities and vital system components comprising a full OS as defined by POSIX.
Many computer users run a modified version of the GNU system every day, without realizing it. Through a peculiar turn of events, the version of GNU which is widely used today is often called Linux, and many of its users are not aware that it is basically the GNU system, developed by the GNU Project.
There really is a Linux, and these people are using it, but it is just a part of the system they use. Linux is the kernel: the program in the system that allocates the machine's resources to the other programs that you run. The kernel is an essential part of an operating system, but useless by itself; it can only function in the context of a complete operating system. Linux is normally used in combination with the GNU operating system: the whole system is basically GNU with Linux added, or GNU/Linux. All the so-called Linux distributions are really distributions of GNU/Linux!
My answer to your question: Yes
You don’t understand how memory allocation works, you can’t compare those two numbers because of the way committed and uncommitted memory is counted. What matters is how it is handled when there is pressure. It similar to how you can’t compare cpu usage without comparing queue length. You also don’t seem to understand how windows doesn’t page out as much or how file caching is effecting your tests. That’s why the video playback spikes it. SMH.
That's why I am dual-booting.
debloat
Is it just me or did they explain Slay the Spire II as though EVERYONE knows its made in Godot ? Does everyone know ?
Like must to be, Linux Tech Tip
I hate Windows and haven't used it for years. But this test doesn't make sense. You should test the behavior close to 100% usage not in (almost) idle mode.
Please make a follow up. This topic is very interesting. But your test was not very significant.
09:26 and they also know more about the hardware itself because. .
please do not use linux mint, use cachyos instead because linux distros differ from one another, cachyos is more leaned towards gaming.
Is your life scientific?
Yes? A scientific test in this context would be one that accurately represents a normal users behaviours in a controlled way where you can identify the influences accurately.
To me, i switched long time ago. I also have a 2015 macbook working perfectly fine in daily use and an aging laptop with a 3050 and integrated memory (GPU use 4GB i think). both with linux mint, both working great. I only have a Windows 10 ssd for certain tasks or random software i can't use in Linux
I've just made the jump to Steam os on my Legion Go what a difference it makes games just run smoother and games that struggled when on windows now just run no pissing about.
I'm so so happy
Personally I think a lot of the difference between windows and Linux is just down to system setup. Windows has to launch all its background runtime applications om start otherwise the system has to be rebooted to load it. Linux on the other hand can get away with only running essential kernel programs, starting, ending and restarting programs. It also helps when an application is ended on Linux most of the time its completely cleaned up unlike windows that can leave things running incase you want to restart an application. Even different distros on Linux can use a different program managers, most commonly Linux will use systemd but on distros like Void Linux which uses run it which is considerable lighter. I had a void Linux installation with a kde environment running on just 500MB of ram on a 32 gig setup which I thought was crazy.
More'er
I've been using Buzzit OS for a year now. I’m waiting for the full-fledged SteamOS, and I’m already trying it out in its current state.
I mean, I personally don't mind tweaking my system a bit and prefer the way stock linux does things and prefer the way linux customization works over windows customization (editing register values in a DOS menue isn't my preference when I can simply copy paste a command into bash, both are blindly doing stuff, one is easier).
I take the slightly worse support from some vendors with that, and simply refund the ganes which don't work
I've been using my 16GB RAM PC with windows for many years. I remember putting 16 GB RAM in it and it felt so great to play games and simultaneously having browser and discord or Skype open. Then, at some point I've started to notice memory constraints. With new CPU and GPU system was very laggy when playing something, games ran okay though. My memory usage sat at roughly 14-15 gigs. Year ago I've switched to Linux. Fedora with kde at first – 11 GB usage max, and system and browsing and so on while gaming felt like it used to be many years ago. Now on catchy with hypralnd system uses 1.3 gigs on idle and RAM usage in demanding games like space marine 2 is around 10-11 gigs. Feels way better than on windows
i dont know if im ready to make the switch, and ive got 64gb of ram so ram usage really isnt a concern for me. but i think i am ready to experiment with a dual boot scenario. linux for regular usage like web browsing, youtube etc, and only switch into windows for gaming and other use cases that simply dont work or work well on linux.
I think you should've monitored swap memory alongside RAM in both systems—that would've given us a better idea of how the systems manage memory usage…
so apparently literally no one read any of the stats on windows task manager, because everyone here is talking about "oh windows commits it all" or "oh windows caches a bunch more"
like, look at task manager, it literally fucking shows the separate stats for that, committed memory and cached memory is NOT counted towards the "in use" and "available" stats on ram in task manager, this isn't fucking windows xp which can barely tell you your ram usage at all, let alone all the different way's it's being used, it's 2026, and this is windows 11, so yes, windows was ACTUALLY using more memory then linux was, full stop, changing the amount of memory wasn't going to change the results in any meaningful way, and i'm surprised that a comments section on a linux video has this much windows defense bullshit, disgusting, microslop does not need your white knighting for their bloated ass OS that costs $300 and still bombards you with ads
The Minish Cap? In this economy?
Stupid test. Should have tested with less ram to see the actual os having to do stuff to make it work with too little ram
Just watching youtube with 1 tab open takes 6.1 GB of RAM … 😒
while premiere doesn't work, you could have tried stuff available on both OS, like DaVinci Resolve, KdenLive or hand break. also gimp, krita or inkscape instead of something like Photoshop.
Interesting results in all categories though
but i think it would also be neat to see the devices actually go to theor limits, i e. testing actual 16 gb and 8gb machines.
Hello, I have a question about my PC. I have a Ryzen 7 5700X, an RX 6750 XT, 16 GB of RAM, and a 1 TB Predator GM3500 NVMe SSD with DRAM.
What is better to reduce stuttering: using the NVMe SSD for Windows 11 + games, or using an SSD for Windows 11 and the NVMe SSD for games? Can the second option cause micro-stutters or FPS drops?
I would be intresserad if he could get it to run smoothly, the last game that is. And what it would take, graphics or something more complicated.
use 16gb or 8gb, Windows will always use more ram if it has access to it just to keep things fast and will give it back to you if any application needs it
Come on this is just Windows that needs to run. You are comparing apples with peers. You cannot say I want to test a strong fast Mercedes against a less powerful one.
These stats say nothing. Actually you can tell based on the trend that isn't the same on both systems, that both OS allocate memory in a different way. Windows reserves more RAM than it actually uses. This means that when it needs to actually use more RAM, there are moments that Windows wont show a spike in usage whereas Linux will.
In the end, the way to actually test RAM-efficiency of both systems is to max their work memory out with memory-heavy tasks, and benchmark it. Doesn't matter if you want to do it with a real world test where you judge how usable a system still is or actually quantify results.
A test like his might work if you went for 8 or 16 GB and then judge the experience, but you can't take the memory usage as a scale of measurement.
And this is even with a fresh install. How many people are actually freshly installing their OS every now and then?
my i3-6100 3.7GHz with 16GB-Ram, 8GB-nvidia Geforce RTX2070 & 480gb SSD had become unable to run win 10 with any kind of respectable speed, I have changed to Linux Mint Xfce & it now runs amazingly well it's now fast & responsive.
Personally I love Linux, I've used it on my main systems for years. Long before it was cool. But in Microsoft's defense I can say that Windows does a lot of caching. Probably too much that and all the spying, I mean telementry going on in the background doesn't help matters any. But if you give windows more ram, it will use it. Windows 11 can run on much, much less ram but if you have a lot Windows will really use it. Probably just a little too much.
As expected from Microslop
there is this video on NJ tech channel which shows ram usage with 8 gb ram on windows vs linux and pretty much the same 4gb extra usage on windows while being out of memory on some games for windows.
I switched last october, and dont plan on going back
I had 16gb on windows last year, and wanted upgrade, bought 9060xt16gb for cheap and wanted to wait one month more for spare money for new ddr5 ram and am5 cpu…. But next month shit happened and instead decided to just replace windows with linux… never had issues with RAM and I think my machine now will last longer… also speed is so much faster, no stutters from caching shaders in emulators and games and even emulator performance improved by around 30%. AMD drivers just works so much better on linux too, no more constant crashes, adrenaline functions that makes games run worse when you ask them to run faster and etc…
Went to Linux around 2 years ago, never looked back.
Switched from Windows 10 to Kubuntu about 2 months ago.
Now I still have to boot up Windows sometimes, because I use Affinity V3 for work purposes and it just does not work well enough on Linux just yet.
But other than that the Kubuntu experience is great. I had some minor issues, that needed fixing (printer added another printing queue after restart and only the original one worked was probably the worst), but once "fixed" they never came up again.
my windows pc exploded about 7 months ago now, and i have been daily driving the steam deck ever sense. I just got a 9060xt 16gb which is the 1st part of my pc build. im going AMD specifically so i can daily drive steam OS on the new rig when i can afford to finish it.
My Arch setup (KDE Plasma) uses 1.9 Gb idle
Why not compare it to specter os