Is corsair dominator worth?

[Profesora]

OK here is the last question from me for tonight

I would like to have initially 4GB DDR2 RAM in the system I am currently putting together with the option to expand it later to 8GB, hence I need 2x2GB chips. The only options at scan for 2x2GB packs are:
4GB (2x2GB) Corsair TwinX and 4GB (2x2GB) Corsair Dominator. The price difference is 15.59, but as my budget is somewhat limited i was wondering if the dominator memory is worth it.

It comes with a memory fan and has DHX, which at least sounds nice . I will be looking into overclocking the Q6600 I am planning to get, so I would suspect heat to be an issue and memory performance as well... so what do you guys think, is it worth 15 quid more for the the dominator RAM?

[staffsMike]

You won't need to overclock that RAM to overclock the Q6600 so heat isn't an issue really. Get the £40 stuff

Thats the ticket
http://www.scan.co.uk/Product.aspx?W...c+CAS+5-5-5-18 frickin bargain that.

[Webby]

Ah your asking completely the wrong question, what you should be asking is should I be getting DDR2-1066 or DDR2-800?

Then we can all chirp in and say since your getting a Q6600 you only need DDR2-800 as you can set the memory divider to 1:1 and overcock the Q6600 to 3.6GHz (assuming it will clock that high) before overclocking the memory.

So save yourself some money and get the DDR2-800 4Gb will set you back £37.50 http://www.scan.co.uk/Product.aspx?WebProductId=632574..

[Profesora]

Once again, thanks for the replies guys

But what about better performance with the DDR2-1066? The latency should be 33% less because of the higher frequency if I am not mistaken, thus resulting in a better overall performance as the cpu will have to wait less for data from memory (especially an overclocked CPU).

I am not planning to operate on large files for that matter, but I do intend to use virtualization heavily and have 40+ active processes at times, hence bringing data from memory fast should make a difference. Or is the 1066 not showing much improvement performancewise over the 800? It does look very tempting to save 40 quid from the memory, but I don't want to compromise performace too much...

[Profesora]

OK, it just occurred to me that I may be making a mistaking in judging that DDR2-1066 will have 30% less latency than the DDR2-800 because the latency is dependent much more on the FSB speed, right? I am getting confused indeed :S So what does the RAM frequency (1066 as opposed to 800) refer to actually and how does it relate to the time it takes to bring any data from the memory?

[Webby]

RAM frequency is based on how many cycles it can complete in a second so 800Mhz 800,000,000 cycles per second so more should be better yes? Well kind of that is not the only parameter, the other thing is timings or latencies these tell you how many cycles it takes for the memory to be ready to do something so if the timings are 4-X-X-X it takes 4 cycles for each access this means at 800MHz you have a latency of 5ns if the timings were 5-X-X-X then it would take 5 cycles so the latency would be 6.25ns. Now move upto 1066MHz and check the available memory all of it (well I'm sure the are some really expensive sticks that are sold at C4) is C5 so now the latency is 4.7ns not a huge difference between 800 C4 and 1066 C5 is the?

So if you are really worried about it go for the C4 800Mhz memory (will still be cheaper than the 1066MHz) http://www.scan.co.uk/Product.aspx?WebProductId=766626.. costs more £58 and it will be a very small performance boost but if you want the fastest for the best price this will be better than £75 for 1066 C5, I would personally stick with the £38 800MHz C5 though.

[-iceblade^]

is that ram good for OC's?

i have developed an affinity for my 2 Black Dragon sticks, lol, and they do fly... Pity they are rare

[Webby]

Which Ram good for OCing? And it all depends what your OCing the whole point in suggesting 800MHz RAM for a Q6600 is that pushing to 3.6Ghz doesn't require a RAM overclock.

If your playing with a 1333 FSB processor and want a big overclock then you really need to be playing with 1066MHz+ RAM Then you can take the FSB to 533 without overclockign the memory.

As to how much the Corsair RAM will clock, my old 2GB (2x1GB) XMS2 800MHz 4-4-4-12 used to run at 998Mhz 5-5-5-15 2.1v but every chip is different.

[Profesora]

Webby, thanks for the great explanation! I am still thinkng about what I really want to do and what is necessary... once I put some order in my head I will post again with a specific system and performance requirements and see how it can be further improved. For now, you have given me more to think about

[moogle]

(well I'm sure the are some really expensive sticks that are sold at C4)

Ballistix D9's can do 1066 C4 with a bit of extra voltage
But then you're limited to the 1GB sticks.

[Webby]

Ah they can do it but they are not sold at that speed, which is what I was pointing towards.

My OCZ Flex run at DDR2-1000 4-4-4-12 have not tried them faster at the latencies because I have no need, my everyday overclock is 3.5GHz (500*7) so no real way of increasing RAM speed on my board with its limited dividers, at FSB of 500 I can have DDR2-1000, DDR2-1200 and DDR2-1600 suffice to say the voltage needed to get even 1200 stable are not worth the negligible performance gains.

[moogle]

Ah they can do it but they are not sold at that speed, which is what I was pointing towards.

My OCZ Flex run at DDR2-1000 4-4-4-12 have not tried them faster at the latencies because I have no need, my everyday overclock is 3.5GHz (500*7) so no real way of increasing RAM speed on my board with its limited dividers, at FSB of 500 I can have DDR2-1000, DDR2-1200 and DDR2-1600 suffice to say the voltage needed to get even 1200 stable are not worth the negligible performance gains.

Ahh true, the only ones that could do that speed (and 2GB in size) would be the Corsair 9136 2x2 Dominator set, but then again thats £200+ per set
Plus it's rare to find it.

[Thorsson]

Ah your asking completely the wrong question, what you should be asking is should I be getting DDR2-1066 or DDR2-800?

Then we can all chirp in and say since your getting a Q6600 you only need DDR2-800 as you can set the memory divider to 1:1 and overcock the Q6600 to 3.6GHz (assuming it will clock that high) before overclocking the memory.

[Profesora]

Ah your asking completely the wrong question, what you should be asking is should I be getting DDR2-1066 or DDR2-800?

Then we can all chirp in and say since your getting a Q6600 you only need DDR2-800 as you can set the memory divider to 1:1 and overcock the Q6600 to 3.6GHz (assuming it will clock that high) before overclocking the memory.

Just to clear up something -- if for some reason I do decide to increase the FSB past 400 MHz and I have DDR2-800 memory, I can still use a DRAM:FSB ratio smaller than one, so that I would not need to overclock the memory and still have the higher FSB speed, right? I am having in mind a DFI P45-T2RS plus board. Is there a specific reason why I would want the ratio to be 1:1 as opposed to 4(DRAM):5(FSB) for instance?

[NightshadowUK]

Back in the day the 1:1 ratio was sought after but now it makes very little (if any) difference to performance. Some boards may have a probem with certain dividers but as long as you do your homework there's no reason you shouldn't use any of the divider options available to you.

I know it's nice to know you could take your FSB past 400 but I'll eat my very trendy hat if you get your Q6600 past 3.6GHz using conventional cooling...

[Webby]

Yeah basically the advantage of the 1:1 ratio is that it stresses the RAM less for each increment in the FSB if you can get it to run faster than 800MHz that is not a bad thing to be avoided just not guaranteed that the RAM will run at those speeds, although I would be surprised if that Corsair RAM did not clock to 900MHz.

I would be surprised if a board offered dividers less than 1 and even if it did you wouldn't want to use them.

Anyway to conclude 3.6GHz is plenty fast enough, if you can push past the 400FSB to say 422 (3.8GHZ) then you would still be running the RAM at 844MHz which should be easily achievable for the Corsair 800MHz sticks.