noob RAM question 2G or 4GB

[Grim Reaper]

Which would give better performance (assumuming Vista64):

2x1GB 1200Mhz DDR2 (Kingston HyperX)
4x1GB 800Mhz (Corsair QuadX)
2x2GB 800Mhz (Corsair TwinX)

The Kingston HyperX and the Corsair QuadX cost about the same.

Thanks

[master811]

4GB is generally a must have for Vista 64, especially if its gonna be used for gaming or anything with lots of Ram usage, for 32 bit you could get away with 2GB (but then you'd only be able to use 3GB anyway).

The Kingston Ram won't be of much benefit unless you intend on OCing past 400MHz FSB as well (and even then is probably overkill, PC8500 (1066Mhz) would be plenty.

[Mad-Max]

4GB for Vista but personally I would get the HyperX and do some oc'ing.

[0iD]

Vista x64... 4gb definately. It regularly uses up to 2gb when idling.

[acrobat]

Vista x64... 4gb definately. It regularly uses up to 2gb when idling.

Is that true, or a joke? Either way its quite funny (although if I was using Vista 64 I wouldnt be laughin)

[mroz]

I don't know what manner of hideous ways Vista finds to waste your resources, but there's no reason why a good OS shouldn't show such system resources as being in use when it has little to do - they'd be being used to cache data temporarily. Indeed it would be wasteful to do otherwise. Obviously when you have a more pressing need for the memory those caches would be discarded. But like I say, I've no idea what Vista is doing. Don't particularly want to know either

[s_kinton]

Is that true, or a joke? Either way its quite funny (although if I was using Vista 64 I wouldnt be laughin)

It only uses 2gb because you have 4gb installed. If you had 2gb installed it would use about 1gb or less.

Both my vista machines use ~35% of their memory at idle. 1 machine has 1gb and the other has 2gb, so its relative.

[Behemoth]

Ahh I wondered why 2 gig wasn't enough for Vista 64 when I was running it, right will have toget another 2 gig of Corsair then

Persoanlly I'd go with Corsair ram, it's always been kind to me

[Robbie G]

I'm constantly amazed that people complain about Vista actually using their RAM in an efficient manner. Would they prefer that their hard-earned went into some chips that just sat in the DIMM slots whistling and picking their arses?

[Blitzen]

I had 2gb when i first used 64bit Vista and things didnt go that well. Slow downs and lock ups mainly.

I put a further 2gb in (4x1gb) and all is great now. All the problems i used to have just disappeared.

Luck or judgement??? I cant say. It does seem the way to go though.

[mroz]

I'm constantly amazed that people complain about Vista actually using their RAM in an efficient manner. Would they prefer that their hard-earned went into some chips that just sat in the DIMM slots whistling and picking their arses?

I don't know if I'd prefer it, but I'd love to see it on YouTube.

[Clunk]

I had 4GiB and 2Gib of it died, 2GiB is now working exactly the same as 4GiB did, and for everyday tasks, 2GiB is easily enough.

However, I still conclude that Vista is utter dog kack. For now at least.

[Grim Reaper]

Looks like 4gb is the way to go - thanks.

Is there much difference between 2x2gb and 4x1gb?

Also for those running Vista64 have you had problems with software/drivers?

[Toobad]

4x1Gb seems to come with slightly tighter timings for the same money but having 2x2Gb would leave you with 2 free slots allowing you to extend the length of your e-Penis at some future date.

[chuckskull]

2x2GB seems to work better on a lot of boards, it's the same situation as 4x512mb vs 2x1gb a couple of years ago.

[mroz]

4x1Gb seems to come with slightly tighter timings for the same money but having 2x2Gb would leave you with 2 free slots allowing you to extend the length of your e-Penis at some future date.

Is there a faq on this? I'm guessing length corresponds to GiB ram & maybe GHz to width? Not sure about heat & noise output. Perhaps e-Penis should be made sticky?

Edit: Just noticed my post count means I'm no longer Registered+. How appropriate - people have been calling me that for years.