Want to add more RAM, don't understand what speed I need.

[moeburn]

So I've decided I want to add 4GB more RAM to the 4GB my system, but I can't figure out what speed I need. Obviously I could just match the speed of my current ram (2x Samsung 2GB DDR3 10700 667mhz), but I don't know if my motherboard is bottlenecking that speed, and if it is, I may as well buy slower RAM. But how do I figure out what RAM bus speed my motherboard/cpu is actually capable of?

Here's some snips from CPU-Z if that helps at all.

PS: I know this question has probably been asked a million times, but I tried looking for the answer on google, I read 3 guides to understanding memory, I searched the forums, couldn't find my answer.

[Haggis Veteran]

what motherboard do you have?

[c.grz]

crucial.com

[moeburn]

what motherboard do you have?

> Mainboard : Acer FRS780M

> North/South Chipset : AMD 780G/SB700

> CPU : Athlon II X4 620 2.6Ghz

There's practically no info for this mobo on the internet tho, I ripped it out of a friend's Acer machine, so its probably a special mobo that is only used in Acer OEM computer packages.

[TheLegendOfMart]

Why do you need 8Gb of ram?

You aren't going to see any performance increase with general tasks and gaming, 4Gb is plenty.

[Haggis Veteran]

I cant find any info on that mainboard lol

[TheLegendOfMart]

The 780G supports up to 16Gb of ram.

[deactivated_]

You aren't going to see any performance increase with general tasks and gaming, 4Gb is plenty.

You aren't going to see any performance decrease with general tasks and gaming, so enjoy your 8Gb once you figure out what you need! Seriously, RAM is dirt cheap these days, and more definitely will not have any negative impact on a system, and can only bring benefit. (However minimal in some or most real world circumstances.) Do I *need* the 24 Gb of RAM in my system? Probably not most of the time, but it's nice to have already in place for if/when there is a need for it.

To OP: My personal recommendation is if your system is happy with your current 2 chips, and you have 2 more free slots, buy identical RAM to what you have.

[Haggis Veteran]

Is your computer an Acer Aspire M3300?

heres the support manual it has the speeds in there :)

http://support.acer.com/acerpanam/Manuals/acer/2010/ServiceGuides/SG_AspireM3300_BOOK_20090410.pdf

[Arceles]

In my case going from 1333 to 1600 improved drastically my ps2 emulation, 8gb is a nice upgrade when speeds or latency is lower, so I say go for it.

[Noir Angel]

If you buy 1600 MHZ memory, it will be underclocked by your bios to match the speed of your 1333 sticks. If you want to buy 1600 MHZ memory, I'd personally sell your current kit and buy a brand new 8GB kit. I personally own this Corsair Vengeance LP 1600 MHZ kit, and it's both cheap and really fast.

[moeburn]

Why do you need 8Gb of ram?

You aren't going to see any performance increase with general tasks and gaming, 4Gb is plenty.

I do a lot of work in Photoshop and After Effects, and they are very memory-intensive apps. I also like to have uTorrent and Firefox running all the time, which are both also pretty heavy on the RAM. The other day I tried having all four apps open, and not only was my system incredibly slow, but also After Effects could only cache like 2 seconds of preview video (normally it can cache at least 30s).

Is your computer an Acer Aspire M3300?

heres the support manual it has the speeds in there :)

http://support.acer....OK_20090410.pdf

It wasn't my computer, and it's just the motherboard from it, placed into a custom computer. But that SOUNDS like the computer it was, to the best of my memory (3 years ago).

So does anyone know what the max memory speed my mobo can support is? Because if my mobo can support higher RAM speeds than the RAM I currently have in there, I'll just replace the whole set with a faster 8GB set.

[Nothing Here]

I would go for Mushkin Enhanced Blackline DDR3 1600. It's the type I have. Get 16gigs of it, it's cheap enough anyways.

[Hum]

So does anyone know what the max memory speed my mobo can support is? Because if my mobo can support higher RAM speeds than the RAM I currently have in there, I'll just replace the whole set with a faster 8GB set.

^ Why don't you simply go to crucial.com as previously suggested, and run the RAM app, which will tell you everything in less than a minute ?

http://www.crucial.com/systemscanner/

[Noir Angel]

I would go for Mushkin Enhanced Blackline DDR3 1600. It's the type I have. Get 16gigs of it, it's cheap enough anyways.

The spec sheet on his computer suggests that it has a max capacity of 8GB

[Nothing Here]

Ah, I must have missed that. 8gigs would be sufficent.

[moeburn]

^ Why don't you simply go to crucial.com as previously suggested, and run the RAM app, which will tell you everything in less than a minute ?

http://www.crucial.com/systemscanner/

Ah, well nobody really suggested anything called a "ram app", someone just said "crucial.com". I assumed it was some website that sold memory, and someone was just trying to help me find a good deal, so I didn't actually open the link. I didn't realise they had a system-scanning app to tell you what RAM you need, thank you for pointing that out, I'll give it a try!

[Hum]

^ Good luck ;)

[moeburn]

LOL:

Crucial System Scanner results for your Acer Aspire M3300 Desktop/PC.

I guess that you were right, that is where this mobo came from!

Memory Type: DDR3 PC3-8500, DDR3 PC3-10600, DDR3 PC3-12800, DDR3 (non-ECC)

Maximum Memory: 8GB

Slots: 4

Each memory slot can hold DDR3 PC3-8500, DDR3 PC3-10600, DDR3 PC3-12800 with a maximum of 2GB per slot.*

*Not to exceed manufacturer supported memory.

Well its a damn good thing I ran this scan before going out and buying two 4GB sticks! Apparently I'll need four 2GB sticks.

[Brandon H Supervisor]

LOL:

I guess that you were right, that is where this mobo came from!

Well its a damn good thing I ran this scan before going out and buying two 4GB sticks! Apparently I'll need four 2GB sticks.

honestly that'll just make it all the cheaper :p

[moeburn]

^ Good luck ;)

Well thank you again for pointing out that site, if it weren't for you I might have wasted my money on some 4gb sticks. If there's any way I can +1 you, I'd like to do it.

So should I bother replacing all 4 slots with matched 2gb sticks, or will there not be much difference if I only get two more 2gb matched sticks (that aren't matched to my current pair of matched 2gb's)?