• theunknownmuncher@lemmy.world
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    4 hours ago

    This applies when RAM is used as temporary cache or something that can be instantly freed the moment it is needed otherwise. This doesn’t really work for justifying higher RAM use by KDE, unless you would never need that RAM for anything else anyway.

    I use KDE because it is good, though. Also I don’t think KDE even uses more RAM than other DEs that are designed to be lightweight. Last time I compared, it used the same or less memory as LXDE.

    • OwOarchist@pawb.social
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      2 hours ago

      Also I don’t think KDE even uses more RAM than other DEs that are designed to be lightweight. Last time I compared, it used the same or less memory as LXDE.

      Yep. KDE is feature-rich, but it’s also highly optimized these days, and the RAM usage is actually competitive with the best of them.

      You can get RAM usage lower on a very stripped down, barebones system, but if you want a full ‘normal computer’ desktop experience that has all the things you’d expect a computer to have, you’d be hard-pressed to find one that uses significantly less RAM than KDE. (Yes, there are some that get lower … but not a lot lower. And unless you’re running on some extremely limited hardware, are those extra 20MB of RAM really going to make a difference in your everyday life?)

    • supermarkus@feddit.org
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      4 hours ago

      Also I don’t think KDE even uses more RAM than other DEs that are designed to be lightweight. Last time I compared, it used the same or less memory as LXDE.

      Firefox without any website loaded uses more RAM than a full Plasma session.

      • OwOarchist@pawb.social
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        2 hours ago

        And KDE can be even more efficient if you go into the settings and tweak things a bit, turning off some unnecessary features that are on by default.

      • catdog@lemmy.ml
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        2 hours ago

        The difference being that in the one of those cases you still need to open a browser instance before you are able to browse the web.

    • chellomere@lemmy.world
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      2 hours ago

      Also, higher ram usage by programs makes it less likely that their actively used RAM (ie what it is actually currently using) fits in your CPUs caches, making them run slower.