In your case, I would say go for at least 8GB, especially if you do a lot of heavy compilation. If your machine supports DDR3, you should be able to find some rather cheap deals.

On Fri, Dec 23, 2011 at 11:13 AM, Robert P. J. Day <rpjday@crashcourse.ca> wrote:
On Fri, 23 Dec 2011, linux guy wrote:

> I'm specing a new laptop, probably a Dell XPS 17, with an i7
> processor.  It will have an SSD and be driving 2 monitors.
>
> The XPS 17s come in two varieties, one with 2 DIMM slots and the other
> with 4 DIMM slots.
>
> - I do a ton of browsing for research purposes and may have as many as
> 20 Firefox sessions open at one time.
> - I use Thunderbird with mail accounts with more than 100K messages in them.
> - I do some software development in Eclipse with gcc.  Compile times
> can be lengthy on some projects.
> - I use Digikam to manage and edit all my Nikon D7000 images, which
> are shot in raw
> - I want to get into editing D7000 video files
> - I want to get into 3D CAD.
>
> How much RAM do I reasonably require ?  Is it worth paying more for 4
> DIMM sockets over 2 ?

 not sure this will help but i went through the same grappling when
spec'ing out a new ASUS monster laptop.  in the end, i learned that
the model advertised as coming with 12G RAM simply had 3/4 slots
filled, and just buying a separate compatible 4G stick to fill it out
to 16G cost all of $29 extra.  problem solved.

 more RAM is generally better, but don't feel you have to pay for it
as part of the advertised model.

rday

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Robert P. J. Day                                 Ottawa, Ontario, CANADA
                       http://crashcourse.ca

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