4GB, 6GB or 8GB of RAM?

[RBrim08]

I'm making a gaming rig of my own for the first time, so I have little experience with just about everything. I know that having more RAM is generally a good idea, but I'm not sure how much is enough or what would be overkill. I have a Twin II Frozr R5850 graphics card, will be getting an AMD Athlon II X4 Propus 640 Quad-Core processor. Games that I plan on playing most of the time would be stuff like Fallout: New Vegas, The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, Spore, and maybe a few others. So, what would be a sufficient amount of RAM for me to get? Or should I just start with 4GB and if that seems sluggish, upgrade to more RAM after that?

 

[tecmo34]

I would start with 4GB of RAM and go from there. Typically, most games don't require more than 3GB of RAM, if that, and you start to see little benefit once you move beyond the 3GB range. 4GB is pretty much the standard (with 6GB fir the X58 setups)

I would recommend reading these two links when you start the actual build. They should help you along your with your build...
■http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/274745-31-step-step-guide-building
■http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/261145-31-read-posting-boot-problems

 

[RBrim08]

I already have bought most of the parts. I was just wondering how much RAM I should get. It gets a little confusing when I have two friends online who keep nagging me to get 8GB of RAM and a liquid cooling system. >.<;;

 

[RBrim08]

Best answer selected by RBrim08.

 

[tecmo34]

8GB is not required unless you are using it for a heavy CAD, HD editing type work, which will benefit from it more.

As for water cooling, the $300 is better spent on an improved GPU/CPU over WC. I won't do WC unless you plan on overclocking over 4.2GHz 24/7 setup. A good WC setup will cost you $300 and the Corsair H50 / H70 are not true water cooling IMO