16GB soldered + 16GB socketed won't fix your gaming FPS.

Probably not. You’re thinking “more RAM = more FPS,” but it’s messier than that.

The issue isn’t capacity—it’s memory channel configuration. If your soldered 16GB is already dual-channel (two 8GB chips on the board), adding a single 16GB stick in the socket forces the system into single-channel mode for the whole pool. Now every memory access runs at half the bandwidth. That often loses FPS in games that were fine on 16GB dual-channel.

Games that actually need >16GB (like Star Citizen, modded Cities: Skylines, or MSFS) will benefit from the extra capacity to avoid stuttering or crashes, but raw FPS gains are tiny—single-digit at best. The bottleneck is usually the GPU or CPU, not RAM size.

If you’re hitting the 16GB cap and seeing stutters, the extra stick helps with smoothness. But if you’re just chasing higher numbers, save your money.

Future You will notice fewer hiccups, not more frames.