If your laptop’s not too old, it should have two ram slots, at least, which means you can easily pick up two pieces of 4GB of each and a total of 8GB of RAM and use it on your laptop. The memory module should pop up at an angle. Note: When you purchase something after clicking links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. However, you can get similar DIMMs from other brands as well. If you’re super-cautious, you could buy an antistatic wrist strap, but unless you’re working on shag carpet on a low-humidity day, you’ll probably be okay. If you keep multiple apps or browser tabs open, 2GB of RAM definitely isn’t enough. We saw a 28 percent boost in graphics performance by moving from single-channel to dual-channel on a Core i3-7100U budget laptop. Unfortunately many laptops have sealed bottoms or memory that's soldered onto the motherboard, both situations which prevent you from upgrade the RAM. As far as capacity, it’s generally recommended that your modules have the same capacity. If the laptop motherboard and operating system allow it, upgrading to an 8GB or 16GB of RAM ensures faster loading of applications and switching between open programs. Many other budget laptops do as well. You'll get an even more detailed view by clicking on the "Open Resource Monitor" option at the bottom of the Task Manager window and navigating to the Memory tab. One of founding fathers of hardcore tech reporting, Gordon has been covering PCs and components since 1998. While not all modern laptops give you access to the RAM, many do provide a way to upgrade your memory. (For another great upgrade, see our article on how to add an SSD to your laptop.). Most laptops that allow user-accessible memory upgrades to do so either through a small access panel on the bottom of the case, or by performing some level of disassembly (sometimes by removing the entire bottom, sometimes by removing the keyboard, sometimes a combination). I want to upgrade to 8GB RAM. There was a problem. For our laptop upgrade we added an 8GB stick of RAM to the existing 4GB stick, tripling the capacity and increasing the memory bandwidth by going from single- … Due to the SODIMM design, it will only slide in one way. If you're close to or over the amount of physical memory, you know you need more. For our laptop upgrade we added an 8GB stick of RAM to the existing 4GB stick, tripling the capacity and increasing the memory bandwidth by going from single- to dual-channel. Thank you for signing up to Laptop Mag. © That’s why we generally recommend that people set low expectations for performance boosts from increased RAM. 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