[xbmcbubba]

The XBMC Live FAQ does not make any mention of RAM requirements.

How much RAM is actually required for XBMC live? (9.04.1 for argument's sake...)

For example, is there any point going over 1GB? Any performance gains with 2GB, 2.5GB, 3GB? Any specific features that might be RAM intensive? (thumbnails, covers, etc?)


DDR1 has now gone up in price, so there's no point paying silly money to get more memory for an older 'board.


Thanks.

[topfs2]

It depends if you install on thumbdrive (removable) or hdd installation.
If you opt for the former XBMC Live will utilize ram instead of /tmp/. So if you plan on streaming from rars then your RAM is your limit here, so if you never stream from bigger files than say, 700-ish mb, then 1gb should be enough.

Generally speaking XBMC doesn't need much ram, it's designed around an embedded system were memory is scarce, and if you have done an HDD installation I would even guess that 512mb is enough I haven't done excessive testing so I can't vouch for it, but lower than that might be stretching it. Still the plan in the long run is to use ram more if available, although we plan to keep the embedded view and design as much as possible so lots of ram will probably never be an requirement!

I can tell you that I ran XBMC Live with 1gb for a long time before I upgraded (only reason I updated was because I changed PC and made the old ram and motherboard into a server). It all depends on your needs, I mostly play from mythtv and not rarred content.

Hope this answers your questions.

Cheers,
Tobias

[xbmcbubba]

To clarify, if you stream .avi, .mpeg, or other native muxed containers from the LAN, then RAM should be a non-issue above 512MB? (no significant benefit?)


Thanks.

It depends if you install on thumbdrive (removable) or hdd installation.
If you opt for the former XBMC Live will utilize ram instead of /tmp/. So if you plan on streaming from rars then your RAM is your limit here, so if you never stream from bigger files than say, 700-ish mb, then 1gb should be enough.

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[topfs2]

To clarify, if you stream .avi, .mpeg, or other native muxed containers from the LAN, then RAM should be a non-issue above 512MB? (no significant benefit?)


Thanks.

Nope it should be of no issue, I don't recommend going lower than 1gb still as I haven't tested it lower than that. But I would guess it runs on 512, not that I think you should go out and buy 512 if you can choose on 1gb

Also to clarify (after speaking with the rar mastermind), if you stream from uncompressed rars /tmp/ isn't used so ram won't be touched.

[anand]

My XBMC PC only has 1GB of RAM and I've never found it to be a limitation.