Memory Option Question

[ccoltmanm]

I currently have four, one gb sticks of ram in my PC. So, I have 4GB.

I also have two, two gb sticks sitting next to me.

Would it make sense for me to put two, two gb sticks and two, one gb sticks in to make six gb available?

The 2gb sticks are 2Rx8 PC2-6400U-666-12. They are Dell SNPYG410C/2G.

My 1gb sticks are currently DDR2 Patriot 8500EL series PC2-6400 400mhz.

What combination should I do?

[+PeterUK MVC]

No reason why you can't just put the 2GB sticks in channel A and 1GB sticks in channel B the only problem you then have is if your OS is 32bit.

[ccoltmanm]

Nope. Running 64bit.

[ccoltmanm]

I now have 4 2gb sticks are 2Rx8 PC2-6400U-666-12. They are Dell SNPYG410C/2G.

My 1gb sticks are currently DDR2 Patriot 1066MHZ PDC22G8500ELK.

OS Version: Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate, Service Pack 1, 64 bit

Processor: Intel® Core2 CPU 6700 @ 2.66GHz, Intel64 Family 6 Model 15 Stepping 6

Processor Count: 2

RAM: 8190 Mb

Graphics Card: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 260, 896 Mb

Hard Drives: C: Total - 305142 MB, Free - 103979 MB; D: Total - 1430796 MB, Free - 534997 MB;

Motherboard: Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd., EP43-UD3L

Antivirus: Microsoft Security Essentials, Updated and Enab

So, 8gb or 4gb. DIfferent speeds and stuff.

[ThaCrip]

so old RAM (i.e. 4x 1GB) was 1066mhz and your new replacement RAM (4x 2GB) is 800mhz according to that "Dell SNPYG410C/2G" part number.

i would imagine the speed loss on the new RAM would be small enough to where the extra 4GB of RAM (so 8GB total) will be overall better especially if you where getting anywhere near running out of RAM when you had 4GB as running out of RAM would surely cause a bigger speed loss to the overall system performance than the 266mhz drop (1066mhz down to 800mhz) would.

[ccoltmanm]

What software can I use I test the two options and see which one is better overall?

[Detection]

4GB @ 1066 is going to feel faster than 8GB @ 800 unless you are constantly maxing out your system with photo/video editing or something

[ThaCrip]

Well software wise i am not sure off the top of my head. but i imagine it's like Detection said... unless your using more than 4GB the faster RAM might be overall better to use in your case as typical day to day use it's unlikely you would use over 4GB.

so unless your gaming or doing video editing etc odds are you won't even use 4GB as even myself i seem to top out around 3-3.5GB but am mostly floating in the 2-3GB (probably more in the 2-2.5GB) range most of the time. even as i type this i got 2.28GB in use and that's with my web browser burning 700MB or so with many tabs open and has been running a while to.

but personally... if you don't notice the speed drop (which i suspect you probably won't in real world use) i would just leave the 8GB in the system and be done with it because then you can guarantee RAM will never be a cause of system slow down into the foreseeable future. but if you done mind burning some time you can try the 4GB 1066mhz with some games or other tests and then do the same with the 8GB 800mhz stuff. i suspect the differences will be very minimal to nothing in real world use.

[ccoltmanm]

I pretty much leave my computer on all the time, and run 3ds Max quite often.

What tests could I run?

Good points, not sure my 1gb sticks ever run at full speed though.