16GB: For most gamers, especially those playing modern and AAA games, 16GB of RAM is the best bet for mid-range settings.

It'll have enough to run the operating system and background apps and leave a few gigabytes of RAM leftover for the games.

8GB: If you're looking to play older games, indie games, or those with less demanding specifications, 8GB is enough to get by.

If in doubt, check the minimum and recommended specifications for the games you're trying to play. However, having too little will result in you not being able to play some games. We'd encourage checking out the video for just a few comparisons of the many options.RAM has a relatively minor impact on gaming performance by itself. Although screenshots can get some of the job done, a comparison video is critical for a game like The Witcher CD Projekt Red's newest RPG makes heavy use of temporal filters, which means that the filters make the most impact over time (seen through movement, which isn't conveyed in a screenshot). We independently benchmarked various game settings on a Titan X (to eliminate bottlenecking on the hardware) and took a graphics settings comparison video, found below. This Witcher 3 optimization guide defines the best graphics settings for improving FPS in the game, seeking to explain each option in greater depth. Since this posting, CD Projekt Red has released a new game patch (1.03) that drastically improves PC performance on various video cards AMD is expected to release a Catalyst 15.5 beta driver update that focuses on the Witcher in the near future.

We recently benchmarked The Witcher 3 for GPU performance and remarked that the game was horridly optimized, taking the opportunity expand on the graphics settings in a limited fashion. Photographers may be familiar with the likes of chromatic aberration and vignetting, but not many games have offered these items for tweaking in the past.

The launch of the Witcher 3 introduced a couple of game graphics options that aren't very commonly available in settings menus.

Optimize pc for gaming updated 2015