Not using it, and have no plans to. I've also blotted out the goddamn purple stripe and the Witcher 3 advertisement - really annoying they don't let you close those without resorting to custom styling.

Steam is consuming 400MB across it's multiple processes on my system right now, are you sure you added up all of the Steam processes?

Yeah, unless Steam has processes which contain neither Steam nor Valve in their name / description. Didn't really look beyond that. My Steam is currently idling in the background - isn't yours downloading/updating something?

My steam is sitting in my systray doing nothing, the memory usage (Working Set) is the 4th column of numbers in the screenshot. Just mentally adding up a ballpark, the 5 Steam processes add up to about 570MB give or take at the moment. Galaxy is using only about 280MB currently.

The numbers for both are trivial noise as far as I'm concerned though. Most of the memory used by any web browser period whether it is a regular browser like Firefox, Chrome, IE, Safari, Opera etc., or it is a modern gaming client like GOG Galaxy, Steam, Origin, Uplay - is mostly post-processed web content such as decompressed JPG/PNG and other images, video data and other content as well as javascript application data etc. Even when you leave a web page for another one whether it is in Firefox, Chrome, Steam or presumably Galaxy, it will cache the prior data because web browsers do that - and it uses up some memory.

The amount of memory reserved for caching data will vary depending on the amount of RAM in the system and the applications built in defaults etc. So some people may see their app using a lot more RAM and others seeing it use a lot less RAM. Someone for example might see my Steam using 570 RAM and think "Oh crap, I'm not using that, that's mega bloated!" But it isn't really. I have 32GB of RAM and it is most likely scaling up the size of the buffers it uses to cache web page content just like any web browser would in order to optimize the speed of displaying the content instead of having to reload it over the network more often. On a much lower RAM machine, it will likely cache far less data and use far less memory.

Web pages today offer rich content that consumes a lot more resources than it did say 15+ years ago, but our computers have evolved in that time frame to handle that too, so content providers take advantage of it to provide a richer experience for us. Personally I like that experience whether it is in a traditional browser, a gaming client or both. Anything that improves my overall user experience, adds convenience or other value is something I tend to like, and I don't mind it using reasonable CPU/RAM resources to provide the experience as long as the usage is reasonable for what it's doing. As a developer, I think a modern browser or gaming client using 200-500MB of RAM to provide a rich web based UI with graphics and video, javascript etc. and a nice user interface is pretty reasonable personally but then I have a modern reasonable computer too. On a 12 year old PC it would be a slugfest. :)

Yep, I'm not using Galaxy.

If it ends up being a lean client that I can just install when I want to download an updated installer, I'll have another look.

If the rumours are true that GOG will eventually discard the GOG downloader, then the above functionality in GOG Galaxy would be mandatory to me.

I have tested it. It is very, very, very beta. There is many to do. I will test it in a half year again. But at the moment is extremely buggy, 50 % of the installers are not ready for Galaxy.... It is too early for a beta test for this software I think.

I did go for galaxy because of the possibities of buying games directly through Galaxy, which is a promise for more security when using prepaid credit card right now and probably a more secure way to use Paysafe as well in the future! (last time I tried Paysafecard via Galaxy was quite bugged!)

In theory accessing the forums via Galaxy could be cool as well, but first of all the forum needs a total overhaul to be ready for the future or even the present! (search engine, HighResSupport, Widescreen-Support,...) Galaxy even lacks more crucial features like quick STRG-Fing in the threads itself!

Well... As it stands, Galaxy is just using a web browser to display the already existing web pages, so the question of security remains unresolved.

I am trying it out. But it's way of doing things isn't so great for those of us who want to keep backup installers. You have to ignore the main download option. Download the backup. Install that manually. Then register that with the client. It's either that or download it twice. That's something that could definitely be improved on.

The functionality to download installers + extras is already in GOG Galaxy client and works fine. Some people report download speed issues in certain countries although I haven't had any problems. Probably just beta growing pains that will get ironed out before the official final release.

Not running it, and no plans to do so. From what I've heard, it doesn't currently offer any particular enhancements to the experience, given the way I deal with the library, downloaders, and installed games. The old downloader has done the job fine for me, a folder for the game launch shortcuts takes care of game launch functionality, and the website handles the community interaction stuff. I really don't see the need - at this time, and if they hold to the promise of Galaxy being optional - to install this thing that simply repeats stuff I can do already without it.

If it simplifies the whole process in a major way, then maybe, but I'll note that It doesn't count as simplification if they decide to just remove some of the old functionality from the website. In other words, if site updates make it such a pain to use the website that suddenly Galaxy looks more attractive - but without actually being any better than using the website from before those updates - then I think that's a loss for the website users, not a gain for Galaxy users.

So what I don't want to see, and yet somewhat suspect given the impending death of support for the downloader, is the website getting nerfed so badly that Galaxy - while labeled 'optional' - is the only practical way to go.

Yes, on a fresh startup without clicking on anything and leaving it sit idle for 60 seconds to reach equilibrium the combined memory of all Steam processes is 260MB for me with the default Store page. I reconfigured it with different start options and here are the results of some of them after 60 seconds of wait time after startup:

Store - 260MB
Library (Detail View with XCOM UFO Defense as the highlit game on startup) - 85MB
Library (List View) - 61MB
Library (Grid View) - 82MB
News - 117MB
Friends - 52MB
Friend Activity - 98MB
Community Home - 440MB (contains lots of images, animations, videos)
Servers - 56MB

This tends to highlight the fact that the web browser/client itself does not consume much memory at all, but rather it is the web content on that uses up the memory as pages are accessed and the data cached for performance. GalaxyClient only has 2 startup options currently:

Store - 230MB
Library - 288MB

Startup memory usage isn't really a terribly useful thing to know though unless one just starts up the given application and leaves it sit in the background not doing anything. Once either application is actually used a bit, memory usage will bounce around a bit and reach an equilibrium point that it sways around. With Galaxy that's between 250-350MB on my system and with Steam it's more like 400-600MB. It's all pocket change though. Literally I mean too, I bought 32GB of RAM 2 27 months ago for $200 CAD. A half a gig of that memory would be 1/64th of it. 1/64th of $200 is $3.13 which is indeed pocket change very much in the "who cares" category. ;o) That was 2 years ago too, but with today's memory and prices it's probably even cheaper.

A program using enough memory that costs the price of a donut and a cup of coffee is not going to even make me lift an eyebrow. :)

Let's see what happens. At the moment I just have to install the GOG downloader, log in once, and I'm good to go for that session. If Galaxy is as quick to install each time I need to make use of it, then I won't have an issue with it, so long as it defaults to privacy settings being enabled.

Just to explain, my offline gaming computer is separate to my internet computer. My offline gaming computer pretty much has a persistent install as it has low risk, so I only refresh it from a backup image once a year to keep it running optimally. My internet computer gets refreshed from a backup image everytime I want to buy something or download something, as I don't believe any antivrus or malware or firewall software is 100% effective, and I don't claim to have the skills required to be able to detect a low level malware infection delivered courtesy of a malware infected site. I don't believe GOG has any malware on its site, but I'm not using my internet computer solely for accessing GOG, and I don't believe any website is 100% safe from a dedicated hacker.

Nah, not important to know at all, that's why I didn't even bother doing the research you just did :D But it's nice to know that when it's just sitting there, solely used to launch games, the client is very minimalistic. Still, yeah, difference between eating up 40 megs and 200 megs is quite negligible with modern computers.

I want your HW prices. What you're describing is cost of 8 gigs of RAM here.