Spyder Veteran Posted March 22, 2004 Veteran Share Posted March 22, 2004 Hey guys. I figured I'd turn to the general wealth of knowledge that Neowin holds for this one.. Let me lead in with what I have: I currently have 2 sticks of 256mb of DDR400. My motherboard has 2 more empty slots. My motherboard is capable of doing the dual channel thing. What I want: more RAM :) Now my issue is this. I can only have roughly $100 to spend, so that leaves me with 2 choices: 1) get another 2 sticks of 256mb or 2) get 1 stick of 512mb I wanted to see your opinions on what you'd do in my situation. Would you... 1) go with the first choice so that the 2 new sticks can be in dual channel as well but then have your RAM slots filled? or 2) go with the 2nd choice to leave future expansion open but not have dual channel (for that pair of slots) at the moment? Please also state why so I can see your reasoning behind it? Thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Samoa Posted March 22, 2004 Share Posted March 22, 2004 I say get the 512mb then sell the two on ebay, then buy another 512mb. (Y) You don't need twin sticks to run dual channel. Just as similiar as possible is enough. ;) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steven Posted March 22, 2004 Share Posted March 22, 2004 Hey guys. I figured I'd turn to the general wealth of knowledge that Neowin holds for this one..Let me lead in with what I have: I currently have 2 sticks of 256mb of DDR400. My motherboard has 2 more empty slots. My motherboard is capable of doing the dual channel thing. What I want: more RAM :) Now my issue is this. I can only have roughly $100 to spend, so that leaves me with 2 choices: 1) get another 2 sticks of 256mb or 2) get 1 stick of 512mb I wanted to see your opinions on what you'd do in my situation. Would you... 1) go with the first choice so that the 2 new sticks can be in dual channel as well but then have your RAM slots filled? or 2) go with the 2nd choice to leave future expansion open but not have dual channel (for that pair of slots) at the moment? Please also state why so I can see your reasoning behind it? Thanks! what RAM brand are you using now? Remember if you get slower latency RAM you'll need to set your Timings properly otherwise your PC won't boot. :/ 1 Stick of 512 Will remove your Dual Channel, thus kill your encoding performance bcause it will at least drop your RAM Bandwidth by Half. Encoding is Processor & RAM Intensive. You'll go from 4800 to like 2400-3000Mb/s (N) Keep Your Dual Channel!! :D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spyder Veteran Posted March 22, 2004 Author Veteran Share Posted March 22, 2004 brand is samsung. i just wanted to know which of those 2 options you'd do, and why? /edit .. also isn't dual channel in each of the matching slots independant of each other? because I thought I read you could have different sizes in each of the matching slots, so long as they're both the same for each? So what I thought that meant is that the dual channel would stay on the 2 matching pair but there wouldn't be dual channel on the singular one in the other 2 slots. is that wrong? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steven Posted March 22, 2004 Share Posted March 22, 2004 i just said why. didn't I? :/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steven Posted March 22, 2004 Share Posted March 22, 2004 Just get the same brand RAM you had before that way you'll keep everything in sync, get 2 of them, and keep your dual channel. Your P4 will run like a dog if you remove the dual channel by using 3 sticks instead of 4. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Samoa Posted March 22, 2004 Share Posted March 22, 2004 brand is samsung.i just wanted to know which of those 2 options you'd do, and why? I would get the two sticks of 256mb, to make a 1gig then. But I point out that what I suggested leaves open the possibility of having 2gigs of ram and would likely work better. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spyder Veteran Posted March 22, 2004 Author Veteran Share Posted March 22, 2004 ok cool so you 2 would stick to the pairing up. thanks! @samoa.. yea, I like the option of keeping the upgrade path open. Thats more or less why I was thinking of 1 stick of 512. but it looks like that wouldn't be wise thanks again guys Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Samoa Posted March 22, 2004 Share Posted March 22, 2004 ok cool so you 2 would stick to the pairing up. thanks!@samoa.. yea, I like the option of keeping the upgrade path open. Thats more or less why I was thinking of 1 stick of 512. but it looks like that wouldn't be wise thanks again guys note the idea was that you could get another 512mb with the money you raise from selling the current ram. But hey good for you. (Y) Let us know how it goes. besides, I don't like messing with ebay these days anyway. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spyder Veteran Posted March 22, 2004 Author Veteran Share Posted March 22, 2004 yea i like that idea. i'll toy with that thought some more :) its too bad i didn't have 200 to drop or i'd just get 2x512 :D i'll keep you updated (and yea, i dont like ebay much either, or online shopping for that matter hehe) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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