I’m getting ready to replace my RPi4 w SSD with a new RPi5 w an NVME drive. My question is this; stick with the standard 8mb board or spend a bit more for the 16mb. I’m currently running the rpi4 w 8mb and a 500mb SSD and performance is decent, but want to build a new system as the primary controller and keep the 4 as an emergency back system. Everything will be new on the 5 including the zwave stick, so I’m hoping I can do a full restore on the OS and the zwave network.
Any thoughts on the 8 vs 16 mb question or my plan in general?
Looking forward to some varying opinions and suggestions.
The things that really consume resources are add-ons, particularly Studio Code Server.
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My only advice is
RAM is the cheapest mistake you can make in a box. Especially of you can’t change it later. Go big or go home.
if you haven’t bought consider a x64 minipc as you’re looking instead of the Pi is bet you’ll find something that Outperforms at the same price.
my NUC blows by any of my Pi by orders of magnitude at the same price. Pi lost thier price/performance edge a long time ago.
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Ditto what Nathan said…
Check and see how much ram you are using now and how often you get into using swap. If 8 is enough on the Pi 4, that’s all you need to know.
I would go for 16GB 
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@owldown
Here’s my Pi memory stats.
This is pretty common on my system. Rarely any swap usage and averaging 50% memory use. Certainly not against go to 16GB, just want to balance cost vs performance.
@Nick4
Thanks for pointing out (gently I might add) that getting older really does suck.
Which brings up my next question. I’ve looked at a couple inexpensive NUC’s on Amazon and watched a few YouTube vids on the HA setup process. The Beeline S12 has a couple pretty complete tutorials and is about the same price as a fully configured Pi5. Here’s my concern. Back in 2016 I jumped on the HA bandwagon using a bare bones RPi3. I pretty quickly out grew that system. Then I was able to get HA up and running on a old Mac Desktop (in some scaled down version) and I missed a lot of the conveniences of the full build along with the Supervisor and all the add-ins. When the RPi4 came out I jumped right back and was very happy with that system.
Now, many years later (and achieving senior citizen status) I’m a little worried about the build on a new platform. I know HA has come a long way, but my MAC build, although fast, was a bear to upgrade and do other tasks on. After 9 good years on a PI I feel like I know the drill, and I’m comfortable there.
So, do I take a risk, going to a new platform on a NUC, with new problems to work through or stick with the tried and true and just upgrade the Pi. Do keep in mind that this is just me trying to stay prepared if something were to fail on my current system. The new build will become the primary controller once its fully functional (whichever platform I go with) and the current system will become the backup in case of a meltdown (or me screwing up something terribly).
I appreciate the feedback so far and really do consider all suggestions.
Art
For me one search on the forum for issues on pi5 answers that question VERY quickly. (lots of weird issues starting etc. I do not consider it a ‘tried and true platform’ compared to x64(X86) and HA is platform agnostic. Your backup will transfer.
If tomorrow you’re not older then today…
RPi’s used to be cheap but that has changed and now new N100 systems are a good alternative.
At the same time, there are a lot of 2nd hand systems which are a good candidate for HA.
It’s just a matter what your HA should do and what other services you want to run on that same system.
Thanks all. I pulled the trigger and ordered the NUC today. Crossing my fingers for a smooth install. Should arrive tomorrow, and the wife is away for four days. Hopefully she comes home to a new HA system (not that she knows the first thing about how it all works). 
Depending on the type of CPU, amount of RAM that you ordered and the services you already run or might run, maybe have a look at Proxmox VE.
If you don’t know it yet: it’s a bare metal hypervisor (virtualisation software) which enables you to run multiple virtualised servers with some interesting benefits.