Is upgrading the RAM worth the money?

We have a dual G5 (2.0) Cluster Node that I want to turn into a full-time Compressor render machine. The primary task this Xserve will do is transcode DV material from Final Cut Pro workstation into MPEG-2 and h.264 programs. I will be connecting an XRAID to it for storage and it sits on a 1000baseT network as well. We currently have just 2 Gb of RAM in it. I am wondering if I will see a significant decrease in rendering time if I max out the RAM. Or, is render speed only a factor of processor power? Thanks!

I have not loaded Compressor yet. I am waiting for my new FCP Studio 2 to arrive. I need to transcode a lot (4000 hours worth) of MPEG-2 program streams. Compressor 2 could not even open these files. I have tested them on a MacPro running Comp 3 at the Apple Store and everything worked fine. I only have the dual G5 cluster to dedicate to this task and just want to help it out the best I can. Upgrading the RAM seems like a cheap and quick thing to do. I know the OS in general runs better with more RAM. I was just wondering how RAM is utilized in the rendering process. I suppose more RAM means less reads from the drives and thus may increase speed but by how much? Would I even notice?

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