Dual DDR quick question

bringitdown

How important is it to buy a matched kit for Dual DDR operation?

e.g. I bought 1 stick of TwinMOS 512Mb DDR 400, if I bought another of the same would Dual DDR work or would I need a matched kit.

A quick google suggestes matched kits gaurantee operation of Dual DDR but that 9/10 times non matched same timing/speed/size sticks will do - anyone ever have any problems?

Cheers
BID

Woden

you should have no probs running another of the same.

i had an issue once trying ot mix two sticks of what was similar ram bought off the xms range by corsair but because the two different sticks of memory used different chips, one CH-5 one BH-5 it didn't work.

so my advice would be to just by another stick of the twinmos

gline

bringitdown wrote:

How important is it to buy a matched kit for Dual DDR operation?

e.g. I bought 1 stick of TwinMOS 512Mb DDR 400, if I bought another of the same would Dual DDR work or would I need a matched kit.

A quick google suggestes matched kits gaurantee operation of Dual DDR but that 9/10 times non matched same timing/speed/size sticks will do - anyone ever have any problems?

Cheers
BID

You wont get dual channel preformance with two dimms , unless they are a dual channel kit.

Woden

eh afaik thats wrong

getting dual channel performance has nothing to do with buying a dual channel kit

my dual channel enabled with mixed corsair memory not from a kit prime95 stability was another issue but dual channel was there

i'm on dual channel now with mixed mushkin and corsair things also

gline

Dataisgod wrote:

eh afaik thats wrong

getting dual channel performance has nothing to do with buying a dual channel kit

my dual channel enabled with mixed corsair memory not from a kit prime95 stability was another issue but dual channel was there

i'm on dual channel now with mixed mushkin and corsair things also

I thought they had to be a matched pair and designed to run together to run in dual channel mode???

Woden

nah afaik its more of a marketing thing, fair enough if you're buying a gig you might as well buy a matched pair guaranteed to work etc., but if you buy half a gig and upgrade later seeking out the same memory should be more than sufficient to have dual channel running.

gline

Dataisgod wrote:

nah afaik its more of a marketing thing, fair enough if you're buying a gig you might as well buy a matched pair guaranteed to work etc., but if you buy half a gig and upgrade later seeking out the same memory should be more than sufficient to have dual channel running.

Ok cool, im having difficulty getting another 512meg of my memory cheap enough, OCZ have stopped production of it awhile back, damn

tman

Dataisgod wrote:

eh afaik thats wrong

yep.

i have a stick of 512mb and 256mb twinmos cheap ram in this rig, damn thing is running in dual channel now :eek:

just buy 2 of the same, matched pairs are a rip off

Woden

yeah i had that problem as well, my 3500 corsair was discontinued as it was BH-5 chips.

when i bought a stick of low latency 3200 to match i couldn't get stability together at a variety of different vdimm's and timings. the stability though was related to dual channel afaik just that i was mixing memory modules

the result being i rma'd it back to komplett. i realised i was being ripped off for the one stick anyway and bought a gig of dual channel mushkin stuff for 260 of www.shop4memory.com

was gonna sell my original corsair stick but stuck it in with it even though my board doesn't support 3 sticks of 3200. it works fine for windows and gaming though i doubt its prime95 stable, while the gig of mushkin is. the 3 sticks where not however stable for a windows install i had to remove the corsair.

anyway long winded ram story aside what i'm saying is that you if you can't get the ocz you could try a similar stick and see if it has the same chips on it or bite the bullet buy a gig pack and sell the original 3500

gline

tman wrote:

yep.

i have a stick of 512mb and 256mb twinmos cheap ram in this rig, damn thing is running in dual channel now :eek:

just buy 2 of the same, matched pairs are a rip off

I wish i could get "cheap" ram for my rig, the price u pay for the athlon fx, heheheh, i aint complainin

Dempsey

tman wrote:

yep.

i have a stick of 512mb and 256mb twinmos cheap ram in this rig, damn thing is running in dual channel now :eek:

just buy 2 of the same, matched pairs are a rip off

How did you manage to get Performance mode with two dimms of different size? First I heard of it

Peformance Mode is enabled when Two dimms of equal size and same timings are used. Easiest way is to buy matched pairs but as long as you can get both dimm's to run the exact same timings(i.e. the closer the specifications) and its fine but the modules will run to the speed of the slower module, if their is one slower

unkel

Yep mismatched ram can still operate as dual channel, even with different size sticks, depending not only on the memory, but very much so on the mobo

To get optimal performance out of mismatched ram is very unlikely though

Dual channel with good memory gives my P4C 3.0 a huge performance boost over cheapo single channel

Not much point in spending a fortune on a cpu if you're going to use crap memory imho...

BloodBath

I wish i could get "cheap" ram for my rig, the price u pay for the athlon fx, heheheh, i aint complainin

I think i've said it to you before but I can't beleive you have such a high end system with only 512mb of RAM :eek:


BloodBath

Azza

I think i've said it to you before but I can't beleive you have such a high end system with only 512mb of RAM

Yeah its a crime. I'm thinking of starting a gline support fund where everyone on boards chips in by sending gline some money towards new ram or send him some ram we aint using

Woden

depends on what you do with the rig though i suppose, i only notice heavy ram usage mainly for games. particularly loading times and also having the ability to alt+tab out of em.

i agree though that a gig is the way forward

tman

Dempsey wrote:

How did you manage to get Performance mode with two dimms of different size? First I heard of it

i didn't even try to turn it on... the mobo just set it automatically on the first boot after putting the 256mb stick in
had a quick look through the bios (abit nf7) for the option to turn it off but i couldn't seem to find it...

Dempsey

The BIOS and Chipset will determine wether it can be activated or not. Buy Im surprised that your using two different sized dimms, thats all.

What are you using to see if its enabled or not?

gline

BloodBath wrote:

I think i've said it to you before but I can't beleive you have such a high end system with only 512mb of RAM :eek:


BloodBath

Like i said before, the ram i am using is nearly extinct because it is out of production ages ago, and where you can get it it's ultra expensive, also i dont think 1gig is completly necessary, not much program or games usin more than 512megs

Mac daddy

Azza wrote:

Yeah its a crime. I'm thinking of starting a gline support fund where everyone on boards chips in by sending gline some money towards new ram or send him some ram we aint using

LOL

tman wrote:

i didn't even try to turn it on... the mobo just set it automatically on the first boot after putting the 256mb stick in
had a quick look through the bios (abit nf7) for the option to turn it off but i couldn't seem to find it...

Most systemboards activate it automatically when - memory is paired up ( interleaving ) Most systemboards do no have a option to turn it off either -

To get the best performance best of pairing it up with the same type of dimm cas levels and dimm speed ie - PC4000 -3500-3200

gline

Azza wrote:

Yeah its a crime. I'm thinking of starting a gline support fund where everyone on boards chips in by sending gline some money towards new ram or send him some ram we aint using

I wont say no, heehheh i have 2 other systems awaiting building, hehehhe, gline support fund, lol

BloodBath

Like i said before, the ram i am using is nearly extinct because it is out of production ages ago, and where you can get it it's ultra expensive, also i dont think 1gig is completly necessary, not much program or games usin more than 512megs

Your wrong there mate. You would notice a big difference in performance with 1 gig especially if your running windows xp which is probably hogging 150-200mb of that ram leaving only 350mb for games. All new games like, doom3, far cry, hl2, bf vietnam are memory hogs.


BloodBath

Optikus

gline wrote:

Like i said before, the ram i am using is nearly extinct because it is out of production ages ago, and where you can get it it's ultra expensive, also i dont think 1gig is completly necessary, not much program or games usin more than 512megs

512MB is bare minimum these days, i recently upgraded from 512 to 1gig cos i was having extreme probs running the latest games and apps.. and you do really notice the difference.

StRiKeR

you not honestly telling us you gonna run your system with 512MB when the system requirement is 512MB for what you are running are you?

gline

StRiKeR wrote:

you not honestly telling us you gonna run your system with 512MB when the system requirement is 512MB for what you are running are you?

i am gonna run my system with what i can afford and what is available, u find the 512meg of the ram i have for under 200 and i will buy it,

Mac daddy

gline wrote:

i am gonna run my system with what i can afford and what is available, u find the 512meg of the ram i have for under 200 and i will buy it,

Maybe Ocz memory 512Mb DDR PC-3500 Enhanced Latency - OCZ

433Mhz, 184 pins, 64 bit, CL2, OCZ EL DDR IC (4.5 ns) w/ copper heatspreader

? 138.84 ex. VAT ? 168incl. VAT

Mac daddy

BloodBath wrote:

Your wrong there mate. You would notice a big difference in performance with 1 gig especially if your running windows xp which is probably hogging 150-200mb of that ram leaving only 350mb for games. All new games like, doom3, far cry, hl2, bf vietnam are memory hogs.


BloodBath

True far cry - hogs about 500Mb when playng at pretty high resolution

unkel

gline wrote:

i am gonna run my system with what i can afford and what is available

Contradictio mon ami

Getting the FX-51 and then adding some el-cheapo ram. It's like buying a Ferrari and then sticking in a 1.0 liter 16 valve Nissan Micra Engine :eek:

You're better off with a BMW M5 :cool:

Eh sorry, translated that means a cheaper, but better performing rig comprising of matching components

BloodBath wrote:

Your wrong there mate. You would notice a big difference in performance with 1 gig especially if your running windows xp which is probably hogging 150-200mb of that ram leaving only 350mb for games. All new games like, doom3, far cry, hl2, bf vietnam are memory hogs.

Yeah, BloodBath right!

astrofool

that is a pretty f*cked up combo actually, seeing as you're going to be hard disk thrashing more often which slows the pc down the most, leaving your expensive graphics card/chip sitting idle.

A cheaper chip with more ram would have given better performance

gline

unkel wrote:

Contradictio mon ami

Getting the FX-51 and then adding some el-cheapo ram. It's like buying a Ferrari and then sticking in a 1.0 liter 16 valve Nissan Micra Engine :eek:

You're better off with a BMW M5 :cool:

Eh sorry, translated that means a cheaper, but better performing rig comprising of matching components



Yeah, BloodBath right!

"some el-cheapo ram"???? The ram cost a lot of cash man at the time, it was the best u can get for socket 940's at the time, i was gonna wait til i got more money to upgrade to 1 gig but then they stopped making it.

Thanks for the link Mac daddy, but that is not ECC ram so it will not suit the socket 940 board, that pc3500 OCZ ram went out of production

irishguy

tman wrote:

i didn't even try to turn it on... the mobo just set it automatically on the first boot after putting the 256mb stick in
had a quick look through the bios (abit nf7) for the option to turn it off but i couldn't seem to find it...

on the nf7 series boards, if you put the memory in slot 1 and 3 it will run [try to run] in dual channel mode any other slots and it will run normally.

Also you would only need more than 512mb of ram if you are playing top of the range games or video/image editing, day to day tasks wont be faster with more memory either will windows. Have a google for windows xp performance levels with more than 512mb of ram [or did they fix this with sp2?] windows just uses more memory if its there, if you were running linux this would be different as linux keeps things in memory untill they are over written, which will speed up opening applications [windows does this to a certain extent also]

bringitdown

COUGH

Just to let ye know, the 2 sticks of TwinMOS 512 MB CL 2.5 are working fine in Dual DDR mode .... cheers

Dempsey

irishguy wrote:

on the nf7 series boards, if you put the memory in slot 1 and 3 it will run [try to run] in dual channel mode any other slots and it will run normally.

To use performance Mode, matched pairs must be inserted into bank 1 & 3 or bank 2 & 4.

SirLemonhead

You can use 2 x 256 and 1 x 512 meg sticks on an abit nf7 board and still retain the dual channel, as far as I know.

RicardoSmith

I think other factors like the GFX card and the CPU will have more effect on gaming than moving from 512 to 1gb.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/doom3-cpu_6.html
http://www.anandtech.com/guides/showdoc.aspx?i=2156&p=2

I have some machines with 1gb and some with 512mb and I don't really notice the difference to be honest. But then the machines are very different so its not easy to compare them.

gline

not true, i noticed a massive difference on my system going from 512meg to 1gig ram, especially on latest games, CS:Source and colin mcrae 2004 (ok not really latest but newish) etc

RicardoSmith

gline wrote:

not true, i noticed a massive difference on my system going from 512meg to 1gig ram, especially on latest games, CS:Source and colin mcrae 2004 (ok not really latest but newish) etc

What the benchmarks aren't true? Can you link to "true" ones then?

Looking at the spc of your machine I could see why you'd notice the difference, everything else is top notch. But if you were do compare the difference between a 9700pro and a x800 or a 2500xp toa a 3500+ vs an extra 512mb of ram, I think you'd see more difference with the gfx or cpu upgrade.

Woden

i think the ram makes a different difference to game play then a new cpu or gfx card its more. load times aside (which i personally see a huge difference) it can mean the difference between a few frags and a few deaths on intial load in when the computer is still accessing the hdd and them similarly important pauses when the computer suddenly decides to access the hdd in game

while if you go to a x800pro from a 9700pro while you can run it at higher res and higher detail its not gonna make the load issues or in game performance drops go away.

gline

sorry its because im running these games at 1600x1200 with full AF and AA, so that probably needs a lot of extra ram for large textures etc, maybe on lower resolutions you mite not need that much ram. But i did notice a massive difference

RicardoSmith

Dataisgod wrote:

...while if you go to a x800pro from a 9700pro while you can run it at higher res and higher detail its not gonna make the load issues or in game performance drops go away.

Well it all depends if you are cpu, gfx or memory bound. Once the game has loaded you shouldn't have any more issues. Its only loading times that are effected by more ram. Or if you are running at the highest res with the largest textures and AA and AF turned up full whack. If you don't use the max textures you won't use that extra ram.

Oh and can someone post some stats to prove that 1gb is faster in anything other than max res with all detail turned up!

Anyone running at that already has a top of the range machine, anyone upgrading obviously doesn't. But I don't think that a 2500xp 9700pro 1gb is going to be quicker in games than a 2500xp x800 with 512mb. I also don't think that a 2500xp 9700, 1gb is going to be quicker than a 3500+ with 9700 and 512mb in gaming or in any other processing applications. Because by the time you are using the extra ram the bottle neck of some other component will already have been reached.

gline

Obviously extra ram isnt going to be as good as a better graphics card or better cpu, but extra ram does help if you have very little free on the system

RicardoSmith

gline wrote:

Obviously extra ram isnt going to be as good as a better graphics card or better cpu, but extra ram does help if you have very little free on the system

Most people thus far are saying scrimp on everything but the ram. That having 1gb is more important than a better gfx or cpu.

Woden

RicardoSmith wrote:

Well it all depends if you are cpu, gfx or memory bound. Once the game has loaded you shouldn't have any more issues. Its only loading times that are effected by more ram. Or if you are running at the highest res with the largest textures and AA and AF turned up full whack. If you don't use the max textures you won't use that extra ram.

i say this with a specific game in mind (BF:V as its what i play most) but i find though that even at moderate resolution such as 1024*768 and moderate details more than 512mb of ram is required for a smooth gaming experience, load times aside it is found that even after the game is loaded the hdd can be assessed quite a bit on 512mb of ram. while i don't doubt you are correct on the systems you mentioned above i find the gig of ram leads to an overall smoother gaming experience not just in game itself but also from other things as not having to close every app i have running before i go in game and also so i have the option to alt + tab out of game to easily access a server manager

so while moving from 512mb to 1gb may not have as big an impact as changing cpu or graphics card i still believe it has a substantial impact

gline

same here, game experiences are a lot smother after the xtra 512meg

RicardoSmith

Dataisgod wrote:

....
so while moving from 512mb to 1gb may not have as big an impact as changing cpu or graphics card i still believe it has a substantial impact

I take your word for it. I don't play that game myself. Though I have to be doubtful as no one can offer benchmarks to prove it....

I have a P2.8/1gb/fx5600 (mobile) and a XP2400/512mb/gf4-4600 here and farcry is only playable at 800x600 with all details low/med on the machine with more ram. That said, dx9/dx8 could be a factor aswell.

gline wrote:

same here, game experiences are a lot smother after the xtra 512meg

In fairness what else could you add to that rig!!!! :eek:

gline

RicardoSmith wrote:

In fairness what else could you add to that rig!!!! :eek:

Hopefully an x800 XT PE soon, LOL