Ram vs optane in laptop

[justagrandma]

I'm looking at 2 laptops that are both windows 10, Intel Core i5-8250U quad core with 1tb 5400 rpm hdd storage. Difference is in RAM. laptop 1 is 20GB ( 4GB + 16GB Intel Optane and laptop 2 is 8GB DDR4 SDRAM 2400mhz. Is there any significant difference between how they will operate for a grade school student for internet class connections or school work?

 

[USAFRet]

Optane will never make up for lack of RAM.
Go for the 8GB system.

https/www.anandtech.com/show/12748/the-intel-optane-memory-m10-64gb-review-optane-caching-refreshed/9
"On the other hand, it is clear that no amount of fast storage can make up for a system crippled by too little RAM, which is a disappointment in a time when SSDs are getting cheaper but RAM prices are still climbing. Optane SSDs may be the fastest swap devices money can buy, but they're no substitute for having adequate RAM. The 4GB low-end configuration we tested is simply not enough anymore, and for future storage caching tests we will consider 8GB as the absolute minimum requirement before any storage performance upgrades should be considered."