RAM Dual-Channeling Question

I'm building my new PC, and ran into a a rather iffy question... I can get either 3 or 4 GBs of RAM for about the same price. I'll be running 32-bit OSs for a few months, so I know only about 3 gigs will be recognised nyways; this is irrelevant because I'll be moving to Vista 64 within about 6 months or so. My question is this...if I have 4 GBs of RAM (4x1GB), will dual-channeling still work for the second pair even if the second stick isn't being recognised by the OS? Would I actually get better performance out of just buying 3 GBs?

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Originally Posted by 2Cold Scorpio

Would I actually get better performance out of just buying 3 GBs?

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no

Quote:

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Originally Posted by 2Cold Scorpio

will dual-channeling still work for the second pair even if the second stick isn't being recognised by the OS?

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It doesn't "block out" a single stick of ram, the ram can still be used in dual channel and the total allocated ram will be lowered due to the 32 bit OS.

IMO get your 4x1GB and then do your upgrade down the road.

Thanks! I just wanted to make sure I wasn't going to cripple the dual-channeling on the second pair of sticks :D