Advice on Ram

[dshepsman]

hi guys

at the minute, ive got 2x512mb PC2700 DDR Ram. i'm thinking of upgrading/replacing it with 2gb (2 x 1gb).

now the question i have is.....

will PC3200 give any noticable performance gains over PC2700?

[Wam7]

It's all about the speed you're running the memory at not what the speed the memory is rated at. i.e PC4200 memory will run pretty much the same as PC2700 if you're running them both at 166Mhz with exactly the same timings.

If you're not overclocking and just running your memory at a stock 200Mhz (400DDR) then PC3200 or PC2700 if it goes that high will be the same. Obviously you'll be better off with PC3200 as it's rated for 200Mhz

Out of interest why are you getting 2gb of memory? You only need that amount if you are doing Music and loading/running lots of samples in memory or very intensive graphics/3D work. You will see no benefits in normal desktop user or even games for that matter.

[dshepsman]

so would it be better just to get 1gb of decent PC3200 instead? or would 2x512mb of PC3200 be better?

[Wam7]

If you are running 200Mhz get 2 sticks of 512Mb PC3200 and put them in the blue DDR slots (dual channel) on your P4P800. Make sure the corresponding motherboard bios is set to 400 and you're all set.

Some motherboard have problems running 1 gig sticks not sure if the P4P800 is one of these but you don't need 2 gigs anyway.

[dshepsman]

ok,cheers for that. probably save me a few hundred £££