New computer runs MS Teams slowly. Will RAM upgrade help?

[PCSPete]

Hi, I've just bought a PC Specialist Aura. Most of my using is basic internet browsing and MS Office stuff.

However I use MS Teams a lot and I've noticed that it runs jerkily and the graphics aren't particularly high quality.

Will an additional 4 gb of RAM make a significant difference or have I just bought a PC that is too slow? Here's the relevant spec:

Processor (CPU)
Intel® Celeron® Dual Core Processor G4930 (3.20GHz) 2MB Cache
Motherboard
ASUS® H310M-A R2.0: Micro-ATX, DDR4, LGA1151, USB 3.1, SATA 6GBs
Memory (RAM)
4GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 2400MHz (1 x 4GB)
Graphics Card
INTEGRATED GRAPHICS ACCELERATOR (GPU)
1st Storage Drive
256GB PCS 2.5" SSD, SATA 6 Gb (500MB/R, 400MB/W)

 

[ubuysa]

If you're running Windows 10 on there another 4GB of RAM will most certainly help! You can use the PCS upgrade service to be sure of getting the right RAM.

The jerky graphics could however be (and most likely are) due to a poor Internet connection

 

[PCSPete]

Thank you! I am indeed running Windows 10. I think my internet connection is fine - MS Teams runs well on another, faster, pc with the same connection.

I'll buy some more RAM. Is it worth getting more than an additional 4gb?

 

[ubuysa]

Thank you! I am indeed running Windows 10. I think my internet connection is fine - MS Teams runs well on another, faster, pc with the same connection.

I'll buy some more RAM. Is it worth getting more than an additional 4gb?

With browsing and basic MS Ofiice stuff as your main uses then a total of 8GB should be fine.

 

[alastc]

Personally I'd go for at least 16GB (in total) but another tip on Teams is to keep the window small when you've got video streams up.

Even on a high-spec machine I've had issues running presentations and Teams across two screens, but reducing the size of the Teams window really helped.

 

[PCSPete]

Thank you - that's a very helpful tip.

Just to double check: it's worth going up to 16gb of ram even though I have a slow CPU?

 

[alastc]

Long story short: Teams is a memory hog, so yes.

Teams, Slack, and quite a few other programmes are based on Electron, which is based on Chromium, like the Chrome browser. It includes most of a browser in the application so it tends to take a lot of memory.

Plus it's a whole lot easier to add/replace memory than a CPU.

 

[PCSPete]

Great. Thank you very much.

I notice that the teams backgrounds option isn't available in this machine. I understand this is the case when the cpu doesn't have AVX2. Googling suggests that might be the case with my Celeron 4930, so I'm assuming that adding more memory won't make any difference to that background issue.

Thank you again, I'll get on and order 12gb if memory.