I mainly play lightweight games such as Old School RuneScape, League of Legends, and Counter-Strike 2, but my FPS is lower than expected, especially in League. The computer also becomes sluggish and occasionally freezes when I have several programs open. I commonly have five to seven browser tabs running YouTube or Twitch while gaming.
My system has a Ryzen 5 4500, Radeon RX 6700 10GB, 16GB of DDR4 memory, a PNY CS1030 500GB NVMe SSD, and a Gigabyte B450M S2H motherboard running BIOS F63d on Windows 11 Pro. Memory usage is already around 85% with only the browser open, while CPU usage is usually 30–55% and GPU usage is low outside games.
I am considering replacing the memory with a 2x16GB DDR4-3200 kit and upgrading the processor to a Ryzen 5 5600 after updating the BIOS. Would the 5600 and extra RAM make a noticeable difference? Is the Ryzen 5 5700X3D worth paying more for on this motherboard, and is there anything else I should check first, such as SSD capacity, BIOS settings, background programs, or power supply issues?
3 Answers
A Ryzen 5 5600 and 32GB kit could make the computer feel substantially smoother without replacing the platform. The 5600 is usually the safer value choice, while the 5700X3D makes sense only if the price difference is acceptable and you want the fastest practical gaming upgrade for AM4. Do not mix memory kits if you can avoid it, and leave enough free space on the SSD for Windows and its pagefile.
Before buying anything, check GPU usage and CPU usage per core during an actual match. If the GPU is far below full load while one or two CPU cores are near maximum, the processor is limiting performance. Also check the SSD's free space and health; a nearly full budget SSD can make paging and general multitasking feel much worse.
The RX 6700 is more than capable for these games, so I would prioritize 32GB of RAM and a CPU upgrade rather than replacing the graphics card. Enable the memory profile after installing the new kit and verify that temperatures and clocks remain normal.
Seeing 85% memory usage in Windows does not automatically mean the RAM is causing low FPS; Windows uses spare memory for caching. However, 16GB can definitely become restrictive with several streaming tabs and a game open, particularly if the system starts paging to the SSD. Check the committed memory and pagefile activity while the freezes occur.
Since performance has always been poor rather than suddenly declining, a Windows reinstall probably will not fix the underlying FPS issue. It could help with general software problems, but I would first check temperatures, drivers, startup programs, and how full the SSD is.
The FPS has always been roughly like this, but the freezes and general sluggishness have become noticeably worse over time.