New MBP i7 17"- Upgrade from 4 to 8 Gigs RAM?

My new laptop is about a week old and I just downloaded FCP-X yesterday. It sounds like from this thread...
"I hate to say this but FCP X is easy ...and fast"

...I should upgrade to 8 Gigs of RAM as it appears FCP-X is a bit of a RAM hog. Everything else is fine, but if FCP-X will run more smoothly I'm guessing making the plunge would make sense. All other apps seem happy with the 4 gigs it came with.

My Projected Workflow is:

1. AVCHD files on external drive (with complete folder structure)

2. Create New Event: point to AVCHD files on external drive; don't copy original media; don't optimize to ProRes 422; create Proxy files.

(I'll know better in a week or two, but...)
I should be able to do most of my editing without dragging around my external FW800/eSata 2 drive RAID 1 setup with me. When I'm ready to export, I can re-connect the drive with the original media. I realize at that point exporting will take longer because I didn't optimize to ProRes 422, but I'm okay with that.

My work is primarily instructional video going on the web, so my software/hardware requirements should be somewhat low. The big question now is whether to drop some more dough on the new RAM.

Thanks,
Dave

Should be automatic for $85.00:

[eshop.macsales.com]

When life gives you dilemmas...make dilemmanade.

Joe,

Yeah, you're right. I've just spent my yearly allowance (so to speak) on the laptop and FCP-X. I'll give it a couple of weeks before drop any more dough, but $85 is not bad.

Do happen to know how RAM hungry FCP-X actually is compared to FCP 7? Has it moved into the PhotoShop realm?

Thanks,
Dave

FCPX utilises every scrap of RAM, and also hits up your graphics card. The bigger those two things are, in theory, the faster it goes.

Jude,

"FCPX utilises every scrap of RAM, and also hits up your graphics card."

Since it's brand new, the graphic card is the AMD Radeon HD 6750M. I'll definitely upgrade the RAM then to 8 gigs pretty soon. I might as well max it out.

Thanks,
Dave

There's a guide here to what is happening behind the scenes with FCPX in terms of CPU. GPU and RAM usage : [silverado.cc] You have to provide an email address to get it.

dgage Wrote:
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>I'll definitely upgrade the RAM then to 8 gigs pretty soon. I might as well max it out.


If you're going to max it out then you'll want the 16GB upgrade :-)
[eshop.macsales.com]

Andy,

Quote
Andy
If you're going to max it out then you'll want the 16GB upgrade :-)

Okay, maybe not that maxed out.