The Silent Hill 2 remake reminded me that RAM is important, so here are some cheap 32GB DDR5 picks from Prime Big Deal Days

Refresh your memory

It’s easy to think of your PC’s RAM as something that just needs to be enough, rather than a powerhouse like the graphics card or CPU. Easy for me, anyway, until testing out the Silent Hill 2 remake this past week served up a reality check: modern games need a lot of memory, and in SH2’s case, might not even get past the Steam launcher if they decide you’re lacking in it. As penance, I’ve found some DDR5 RAM deals in the Prime Big Deal Days sales that should set any modern rig for years and years of... well, games launching properly, I suppose.

As such, while 16GB is the bare minimum you can get away with, I’d recommend 32GB to be safe. For pure value, check out Crucial’s DDR5 Pro set, which I've been using in my own testing setup for a while: it’s down from £140 to £80 on Amazon UK, and down from $150 to $81 on Amazon US. But the single best deal here, I reckon, is Corsair’s Vengeance RGB kit, which the US site has slashed from $130 to $100. That’s the same price as the non-RGB equivalent kit while also being faster, at 6400MHz to 6000MHz. Us UK folk can also get a similar set for £101, down from £147, though that’s set at 6000MHz.

UK deals:

Crucial DDR5 Pro 32GB

2x 16GB, 6000MHz

See at Amazon

Corsair Vengeance RGB DDR5 32GB

2x 16GB, 6000MHz

See at Amazon

US deals:

Crucial DDR5 Pro 32GB

2x 16GB, 6000MHz

See at Amazon

Corsair Vengeance RGB DDR5 32GB

2x 16GB, 6000MHz

See at Amazon

I know I said yesterday, in that AMD Ryzen 7 5700X3D spotlight, that DDR5 doesn’t necessarily produce quicker game performance than DDR4. But looking at the motherboards that have released in the last two years, it’s become apparent that DRR5 is very much becoming the new normal, so if you’re building a PC in 2024 then it makes sense to go for the newer standard unless you’re specifically wanting a budget spec. And there's no sense in passing up the opportunity to get some new sticks for less, eh?

Be quick, though, as Prime Big Deal Days ends today, October 9th.