recommend Ram please....

stevejazzx

Hi building a new rig, almost there, buying ram soon, don't know a lot about ram except I need ddrsdram 184 pin for my mobo
so I've heard of low latency etc but was hoping if someone could guide me along the right tracks.

also will I see a big performance increse if I go for 2gig over 1 gig?

cheers

Alkers

Don't know if you've bought your mobo yet, might save a few squid getting this instead: http://www.komplett.ie/k/ki.asp?sku=319857
Are you going to be overclocking or not? What's the pc going to be used for?

8T8

Low latency is a luxury it is a nice improvement to have if you can afford it but by no means absolutely necessary, having low latency RAM tends to benefit professional applications more than other types of software.

Given a choice I would go with 2GB of RAM over 1GB (low latency or not), 2GB is the sweet spot in XP for "power users" you needn't go any higher unless you have some specific application that demands it.

The performance improvement wont be too noticeable in that you will certainly lower the number of scenarios the system pages to disk though this can never be completely stopped but subjectively the system should be smoother when dealing with memory intensive applications like running lots of programs simultaneously and running games.

[My own bias here but personally the Asus A8N line have given me nothing but trouble, Google A8N problems to see for yourself I would go with another nForce 4 brand motherboard from one of the other vendors like Gigabyte or Epox.]

Have you bought the CPU yet as AMD's new socket AM2 is out and so are supporting motherboards I would do with those instead so you have a CPU upgrade path instead of buying into S939 now, the AM2 CPU's uses DDR2 as well which you'll need.

SeanW

As for if you'll see a big increase in performance? Probably not at the moment unless you want to do some serious gaming, or prepare for the future.

BTW memory management has just become a much more complicated affair than it used to be several years ago, it's no longer just a question of plug-and-play.

I know because I bought a Sapphire mobo and had some major headaches with memory till I moved one of my 1GB sticks of RAM to the other memory controller. Still don't know why.

My adivce would be anticipate your future needs now, and buy that much RAM from the get-go, in as few physical sticks as possible (as in, if you want 1GB, get one 1 GB stick instead of 2 512MBs in a kit).

Edit: Just saw you linked to the mobo, I'd advise you to go for PC3200 RAM, just because that board supports older standards, as far back as PC2100 doesn't mean they'll give you the performance you need, PC3200 is the standard for RAM in Socket 939 systems and most mobos support that and nothing else.

stevejazzx

Simona1986 wrote:

Don't know if you've bought your mobo yet, might save a few squid getting this instead: http://www.komplett.ie/k/ki.asp?sku=319857
Are you going to be overclocking or not? What's the pc going to be used for?

Pro-ish audio =, video/mpc encoding, gaming

8t8 wrote:

Have you bought the CPU yet as AMD's new socket AM2 is out and so are supporting motherboards I would do with those instead so you have a CPU upgrade path instead of buying into S939 now, the AM2 CPU's uses DDR2 as well which you'll need.

all i see in that link is a sempron am2 1.6ghz, would I really be better off going for one one them and upgrading

8t8 wrote:

that board has given me nothing but trouble

hmmmm you're not the first the person to say this, although before i bought it i checked out a lot of reviews which said it was a great board....in what way did it trouble you ?

stevejazzx

http://komplett.ie/k/ki.asp?sku=316000

good or bad choice

Naikon

Simply if you dont want to overclock go with Corsair value select ram as they are just as good as the "Extreme" RAM varients but just dont take as kindley to extra voltage being pumped through them.

8T8

stevejazzx wrote:

all i see in that link is a sempron am2 1.6ghz, would I really be better off going for one one them and upgrading

I wasn't referring to the Sempron specifically really any socket AM2 CPU that fits your price range but it seems Komplett don't have any in stock yet. The only reason going AM2 is that well you get a new nForce 5 motherboard with some new features like HD Audio and it offers an upgrade path for the future as S939 has pretty much reached the end of the line.

stevejazzx wrote:

hmmmm you're not the first the person to say this, although before i bought it i checked out a lot of reviews which said it was a great board....in what way did it trouble you ?

Compatibility problems with HD's, general instability, IO corruption (not related to nForce 4 firewall corruption bug), with the exact same hardware no change whatsoever I hooked up to an Epox nForce 4 and it was rock solid. The major problem with motherboard reviews (bar one or two sites) is they rarely ever touch on extended testing or stability, just run it through some benchmarks and slap a score on it.

Try looking at Google with A8N problems & take a look at Asus own forums for more fun & games - really I would stay away and go with someone else.

stevejazzx

Compatibility problems with HD's, general instability, IO corruption (not related to nForce 4 firewall corruption bug), with the exact same hardware no change whatsoever I hooked up to an Epox nForce 4 and it was rock solid. The major problem with motherboard reviews (bar one or two sites) is they rarely ever touch on extended testing or stability, just run it through some benchmarks and slap a score on it.

Try looking at Google with A8N problems & take a look at Asus own forums for more fun & games - really I would stay away and go with someone else.[/QUOTE]


doh! Yeah I've heard people banging on about hd instability etc....
might build an am2 rig....looking into that now, jesus does it ever end?....
thanks for the advice/tips

Alkers

The 3500+, 4600+ and the 4800+ are all in stock in komplett now...

Sengoku79

for future proofing purposes i.e. possible vista install/bf2 playing etc, i would recommend getting a 2gig kit (2*1gig stick),

I would not recommend spending too much on low latency ram unless you are definitely going to o/c your machine

corsair value prob your best choice unless your o/cing

good luck

dougadam

I would buy as much ram as you can.