Which affects speed more? Processor or RAM?

[runequester]

This might be a dumb question but I am relatively uneducated about computer hardware in general, and the amiga in particular (mine was never expanded).
 
Which will affect an amiga's speed and performance more? Adding fast ram or adding a faster processor ?

[matthey]

Processor! The processor has caches that are extremely fast memory. Most Amiga programs are small and a good portion of the programs can stay in the cache on later 68k processors. The memory speed is still important though. Some programs will slow down a lot with slow memory.

[dougal]

Both

A processor first and foremost.

Most decent accelerator cards like the Blizzard have 32bit fast memory slots and the difference in speed is very noticiable with the 32bit memory .

Example: My (now sold) A4000D had a 68030 at 50Mhz but the standard ram installed on the motherboard. My A1200 had a 68030 at 50Mhz too but the Blizzard 1230 had 32bit ram installed and it was noticibly faster then the A4000.

This might be a dumb question but I am relatively uneducated about computer hardware in general, and the amiga in particular (mine was never expanded).
 
Which will affect an amiga's speed and performance more? Adding fast ram or adding a faster processor ?

[a1200]

That's certainly true in Amiga terms, but in the world of Windows and Linux, anything to stop the need for a swap/page file will make the speed of the machine, not faster, but no slower (if that makes sense). Pound for pound I would ramp up a machine with more than enough RAM then look at the CPU.

[dougal]

If you have an A1200 i highly recomend the Phase5 Blizzard 1230IV. You can pick one up for around 125 - 160 Euros.

I regret selling mine, although it was for a greater cause (See my Sig)

[Dr_Righteous]

In my experience on an Amiga, your processor is going to be the largest impact in speed. RAM would be second, depending on how you expand it, since there's no virtual memory on Amigas. Hard drive access time would be next in line (ergo the popularity of using compact flash drives).

On a modern PC, RAM is more critical to performance since the more you have, the less swapping to virtual memory occurs. CPU would be next in line followed by hard drive speed (for when swapping does occur).

[edit]Holy cow you guys are fast! There were no responses when I started writing...[/edit]

[koshman]

A little OT, but I don't really like this fashion statement of sorts that RAM speeds up a computer. That's just not true. If you do anything that actually requires speedy system RAM is not gonna help you - that's why they call these tasks CPU intensive. As for the user experience as the whole, sure, it gets better, because you don't have to wait for the computer that much, but it doesn't give you more FPS in a game.

[Karlos]

A little OT, but I don't really like this fashion statement of sorts that RAM speeds up a computer. That's just not true. If you do anything that actually requires speedy system RAM is not gonna help you - that's why they call these tasks CPU intensive. As for the user experience as the whole, sure, it gets better, because you don't have to wait for the computer that much, but it doesn't give you more FPS in a game.

Actually, that's completely untrue for modern games. I noticed a significant improvement just by increasing the amount of RAM in my main gaming system from 2GB to 4GB. The reason is that a lot of modern games (particularly "open" environment ones like Fallout 3, Crysis etc) use very large datasets that generally can't all be loaded at once and so stuff has to be paged in and out as needed. More RAM, less reloading of data from disk, better performance.

[koshman]

What exactly do you mean in practice? Is it the dynamic loading of new areas while traversing the capital wasteland? I would still say that this is rather the overall experience than higher speed as such. E.g. when I'm playing a game and it stops for 5 seconds every 2 minutes to load a new area it's a little annoying, but I can tolerate that and I know that when the area loads the speed will be (should be) the same on my 2GB system as on my neighbour's 4GB system. It's the same as loading at a start of a new game only it takes place in the course it.

EDIT: I completely agree that the game can be more enjoyable with more RAM, but it doesn't technically run faster - if the screen refresh during combat is low, buying more RAM doesn't solve that.

[runequester]

Thanks guys. I should have specified that I was meaning the amiga specifically, but it never hurts to be educated about these things

[Tenacious]

A great deal depends upon which Amiga you're talking about!

68000 (16-bit data bus) Amigas (1000, 500, 600) perform noticeably better with TRUE (still 16-bit) fast ram.  Adding a 32-bit processor (68020, 68030, 68040,68060) alone is a mere modest boost.  A 32-bit accelerator with 32-bit fast ram gives a large boost in performance.

Everything depends on which Amiga and how far you ultimately intend to expand it.

[save2600]

A great deal depends upon which Amiga you're talking about!

68000 (16-bit data bus) Amigas (1000, 500, 600) perform noticeably better with TRUE (still 16-bit) fast ram.  Adding a 32-bit processor (68020, 68030, 68040,68060) alone is a mere modest boost.  A 32-bit accelerator with 32-bit fast ram gives a large boost in performance.

Everything depends on which Amiga and how far you ultimately intend to expand it.

That just about sums it up extremely well and has been my experience.

[Karlos]

@koshman

My experience is that, depending on the settings I use in a game, additional RAM almost always helps - from the odd loading jerkiness to the ability to keep large textures cached in RAM for longer. However, I grant you it doesn't just make things "faster", instead it helps stop them from getting slower, by mitigating latencies from parts of an application that might otherwise have to go to disk to retrieve something.

EDIT: I completely agree that the game can be more enjoyable with more RAM, but it doesn't technically run faster - if the screen refresh during combat is low, buying more RAM doesn't solve that.

Well, again, that also depends on your settings and quantity of RAM of the "right sort" can make a big difference. Try playing games that use large graphical datasets on identical GPUs but with different amounts of video RAM. Without enough dedicated ram on the graphics card, frame rates can plummet through the floor as data is streamed constantly from system ram into the graphics card.

Now, regarding the Amiga, there is a definite case that adding RAM can improve performance markedly. Just try using any 68020+ with Chip RAM only

[koshman]

Yeah, I totally agree with the VRAM issue. My poor 8800GS with 384MB... :-)

[Ilwrath]

Well, it's all depending on the type of system we're talking about, and where the bottleneck currently is.

Taking an Amiga 1200, for example, it's completely hobbled when it can only access Chip RAM.  Adding some 32-bit Fast RAM makes a _HUGE_ difference.  If you test an A1200 with an '030 card with 2MB Chip/0MB Fast and compare typical processing vs. an A1200 with the stock '020 but a 8MB 32-bit board...  The one with the '020 and Fast RAM will win that fight most of the time.  Of course, add a stick of Fast RAM to that '030 board, and then it's easily back on top.

So...  For old school Amigas...  Fast RAM helps.  Faster CPU with on-board Fast RAM helps more.  (But adding just a faster CPU, without giving it a 32-bit path to Fast RAM, doesn't help that much.  [unless, as stated, you manage to fit all the instructions into cache, which is VERY UNLIKELY, as the '030 had something like 256 _BYTES_ of cache...]  That is why most CPU expansions also include Fast RAM.)  

More modern systems are a little harder to figure out.  But, typically, you want to find the bottle-neck and increase that.  (Sometimes it's the CPU speed, sometimes it's the RAM speed, and sometimes it's swapping a bunch, which means RAM size.)