Shud i have 2GB matched, or 4GB 2x differant pairs?

[MiST91]

okay, for quite a while i'v had 4GB RAM, i'v had 2x1GB Corsair XMS2 DHX DDR2 800MHz and 2x1GB OCZ Value RAM 667MHz DDR2 overclocked to 800MHz, and i was thinkin today, would my computer be faster if i overclocked the Corsair RAM and only had 2GB, or havin 4GB RAM?

 

[Darknova]

I'd say the 2Gb overclocked...the OCZ would only hold back your overclock.

If they were the same speed I'd say both.

 

[MiST91]

so you think it would be worth losing 2GB (1.5GB 32bit) of RAM to overclock the Corsair?

if so, how far do you think the corsair XMS2 DHX will go?

 

[Darknova]

so you think it would be worth losing 2GB (1.5GB 32bit) of RAM to overclock the Corsair?

if so, how far do you think the corsair XMS2 DHX will go?

1.5Gb? what do you mean by that?

Well, my old Corsair XMS2 would do 1000Mhz.

 

[MiST91]

i only get 3.5GB in Windows XP 32bit, so removing 2GB RAM, i will only loose 1.5GB of available RAM.



but there is 4GB RAM in my PC (2x1GB crucial XMS2 and 2x1GB OCZ

 

[Darknova]

i only get 3.5GB in Windows XP 32bit, so removing 2GB RAM, i will only loose 1.5GB of available RAM.

Ah, now I get ya. For XP 2Gb does perfectly fine, so fast 2Gb worth of RAM is much better than 4Gb of slow RAM IMO.

 

[MiST91]

ok, nice one "Dark Nova"

 

[MiST91]

anyone else got an opinion?

 

[cincybengal]

I have 64bit Vista and haven't noticed a difference downgrading memory to 2x1 from 4x1 and o'clocking e8400 to 3.6ghz. Personally I like the 2gb better because I can play with settings more than with 4gb because the memory has to be underclocked to be stable. I look forward to going to 2x2 in the near future but will stick with 2x1 until then.

 

[pbmaster]

You should definitely take out the OCZ and OC the Corsair. My Corsair can do 1000 MHz at 4-4-4-12 at it flies.

 

[Pandaz3]

I am not a fan of mismatched pairs, generally more ram equals better, but you are really making it tough on the memory controller using mismatched stuff.

 

[Darknova]

I have 64bit Vista and haven't noticed a difference downgrading memory to 2x1 from 4x1 and o'clocking e8400 to 3.6ghz. Personally I like the 2gb better because I can play with settings more than with 4gb because the memory has to be underclocked to be stable. I look forward to going to 2x2 in the near future but will stick with 2x1 until then.

Then I think you have an issue with your RAM tbh. I've got 4x1 and I've got the same overclock I got with 2x1 and same timings...

 

[Pandaz3]

I had 4 X 512 of matched Corsair PC3200XL (2-2-2-5) in my AN8 Fatal1ty using a Opteron 185 and Vista Home Premium 64 and I was pretty much hating life, 2 X 512 wasn't quite enough. I put 2 X 1 Corsair PC3200C2PT and now it came into it's own. I attribute that to the memory controller not being best suited to eight banks of memory.

Four sticks of single sided memory would be just four banks and the controller can handle that just fine. Just hard to find single sided sticks anymore.

Now this was with DDR and 939 series CPU's. I do expect the controller on AM2 and later CPU's to be better and DDR2 to be easier to control, but I am prejudiced toward two sticks only. I am using 2 X 2048 AData PC6400 with Vista Ultimate 64 and 2 X 1024 Patriot PC6400 in another with Vista Home Premium 64. Vista works well with two Gig, more is better of course, but I will stay with two sticks.