Excel RAM Usage question

[Mathman]

I run excel 64 bit version. I have a Master excel sheet that runs other excel driven macros where I can open up multiple instances all running many macros all at the same time.


I was running a test where I had 21 instances run at the same time on a 7700K with 32 Gigs of RAM, the RAM usage got up to 25-26 Gigs


I ran the same test on a 8700K with 16 Gigs of RAM. I expected to max out the RAM but even though I got close it never pushed to 100% but got in the 90-95% range


Any idea why that is? Also does excel know how much RAM is available and will automatically divide available RAM for what's needed so it doesn't have an "uneven" RAM distribution for the work load as it seems to keep the use spread evenly. Just wondering if more RAM on the 8700K would increase productivity.


Thanks
MM​

 

[BiocideJ]

I'm certainly no expert on this topic, but it is possible that computer allocates virtual RAM (basically a portion of the HD utilitized as RAM). It would be slower than dedicated RAM, but could explain why you didn't max out what the other system had.

 

[Jack in the UK]

Time to go back, way way back in t9o my memory

Excel is a bit different in many ways, one is memory, usage, handling and reallocations

If I recall right:
Excel swipes a chunk of memory and that it, no more ones full/used is done, thus problems arise
Each session of (instance) excel takes a slice of this cake (memory), so your running slices and running excel in each slice. The maths to all this I can not recall and never really understood

Good practice dictates that one session be run, or two max to take nice big chunks

Now Excel I recall take a slice of whats left at the time or request, i.e. % of the pot remaining

So being a law to itself Excel never follow hard cast example, and things can over run slow. You can tweak Windows but Excel decides

My call would be to run whats needed, link a last code to call the next so they run after each other not all in one instance

Also code to release everything once completed with that script, thus releasing memory and making better code

May take longer in all to run, should be smoother and less problematic if that makes sence

jiuk