It’s happened to the best of us. You open an application, like a PowerPoint presentation, spend hours on a big new client proposal… and then accidentally click out without saving. These days, there are usually ways to restore and save that lost doc, but most of us with a few decades under our belts remember a time when that presentation would have been forever gone.

What happens when you open that PowerPoint or any other application? What happens when you click out without saving it? If you’ve ever wanted the answer to these questions, then you’ve come to the right blog post.

The moment you open any file or application, your computer loads it into your RAM, (random access memory), which is a temporary memory system within your computer. RAM allows your computer to access the files you’re using right now as quickly as possible, but it is not meant to be a permanent storage place.

The RAM is not big enough to hold and run all of the files on your computer. That’s why you might notice that your computer becomes sluggish if you have too many big applications open (like streaming video). When that happens, it means your RAM is full and can’t juggle all the programs you’re asking it to.

Because the RAM is not meant for permanent storage, it will purge any files and applications as soon as you close out of a program. That’s why, in the past, it was so easy to accidentally lose files if you didn’t save them.

By the way, when you save files, they are moved out of the RAM and loaded into more permanent storage, like your computer’s hard drive. Depending on how your computer is set up, saved files may also go into cloud storage.

Fortunately, these days, files are rarely lost forever even if you or your officemates forget to save. Many programs or hard drives continually back up all files. If you close out of a file without saving, you can access an earlier backup to retrieve it. Many applications also now continually save files to prevent loss.

If you notice that applications on the computers in your office are loading and responding slowly, it may be because your computers do not have enough RAM. In this case, you may want to consider investing in additional RAM storage for all the computers in your office. At Memory America, we offer the computer memory you need for exceptional computing.