4 GB of DDR3 1600 or 6GB of DDR3 1333?

[blackroseMD1]

Alright guys...so newegg just informed me that I won the following memory in a Facebook contest: Crucial Ballistix 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 with heat spreaders and built in thermal sensor

The wording on the contest is vague, so I'm not sure if I'm getting 4 or 8GB of it. Right now, I have 6 GB of Crucial DDR3 1333 RAM in my comp. I was just wondering how much performance, if any, I would lose by replacing it with the RAM that I won (assuming they only send me 4GB).

 

[severedsolo]

It depends what your doing with it. If your not doing anything memory intensive then probably hardly any, 4GB is about the sweet spot with Win 7, and the access speed on that RAM is quicker

 

[blackroseMD1]

Well, as it is now, with my CPU overclocked, my RAM is running at 1430. I do some work in PS CS5, usually no more than 25-30 pictures open at a time though, and some gaming (GTAIV, Bioshock 2, Assassin's Creed II).

I'm thinking, either way, if they only send me 4GB, I can just grab another 4 gigs for $120 and be back up to 8GB.

 

[severedsolo]

Well call me silly... but by my maths 1600 is still faster than 1430

Having said that, your new Ram might not be so overclocking friendly, which might cause you a few problems. As I said, it depends, if you NEED 6GB then keep what you've got, or grab another couple of sticks, otherwise you may as well use the new one.

 

[blackroseMD1]

Well call me silly... but by my maths 1600 is still faster than 1430

Having said that, your new Ram might not be so overclocking friendly, which might cause you a few problems. As I said, it depends, if you NEED 6GB then keep what you've got, or grab another couple of sticks, otherwise you may as well use the new one.

Yeah, that's what I was thinking too. Although, with the heat spreaders and the built in thermal sensors, they should be pretty decent overclockers. The OC I have now wouldn't even be enough to overclock those sticks. Think I'm just going to throw them in when they get here and check them out.

Thanks for the advice.

 

[severedsolo]

No Problem mate, let us know how you get on

 

[housry23]

Honestly you will see minimal if any difference when running 1600 speed over what you have currently. Since you do run memory intensive apps you will benefit from more ram than you would from less ram with more speed. You would get the best performance if you did get 8GB of whatever you won, but I still doubt you will see much improvement over what you have now. If you are not close to maxing out your 6gb then 8 won't be faster.

 

[Night Hawk]

On a new build here the DDR3 1600 was actually backclocked to 1066 due to it being 1.9v while the board runs at 1.5v for all four dimms slots. The larger benefit was seeing the replacement 1.5v memory running at 1600mhz rather then buying faster DDR3 1866 1.9v to see that backclocked to 1600.

As for going from 4gb upto 8gb don't expect any real performance gain as you would have seen going from 1gb upto 2gb on XP or Vista. The option for the larger amount of ram is best served when running memory hungry softwares as housry23 was mentioning there.

For the 8gb now seen there that will be good for TurboCAD 12 on presently as well as other 3d modeling and eventually animation projects. Check your board specifications on voltages as well as memory speeds supported as well as the specs on the memory you won and make comparisons before deciding since you want 1600 to run at 1600 and are better off with 6-8gb of the faster memory.

 

[BCXtreme]

I see your motherboard only has four RAM slots. What sizes are your individual RAM chips?

 

[Night Hawk]

The memory is strictly 2gb dimms since 4gb dimms are still priced way up there. Otherwise I would have gone for a matched pair of 4gb dimms. So far no ill effects have been seen with all four slots populated however once the memory with the correct voltage was installed.

The first pair of 2gb dimms will be reused for another new 7 build being planned there. When adding the second of the correct memory in to go up from 4gb to the 8gb now in there wasn't any particular performance gain to see. You may find that 7 or Vista 64 will run smoother however while don't expect any large boost performance wise.

 

[blackroseMD1]

I see your motherboard only has four RAM slots. What sizes are your individual RAM chips?

Yeah, I have 3 sticks of 2GB. I had 4, but one of the sticks was bad. They are all matching sticks, but it just feels weird to me to have 6GB of RAM. Seems more natural to have either 4 or 8.

 

[A Guy]

All things being equal (very unlikely), I'd say go with the faster RAM unless you use very memory intensive apps. The actual timings come in to play as well. If the 1333's are 7-7-7- and the 1600's are 9-9-9- you would probably be better off with the faster timings. Those that you link to are 8-8-8-24. Here is link to datasheet pdf:

Data Sheet

These are specifically enthusiast RAM. Made for overclockers. You can run them at same multi as you have now, and they would not even be overclocked yet. So you have room to play with tighter timings or higher clock settings.

I also think it is better to run 2 sticks of ram, or at least better than 1 large stick. As far as quality, it's likely these new sticks are superior. It may come down to "seat of the pants" feel. A Guy

 

[smarteyeball]

The performance 'difference' would depend on what latencies of those kits are compared to your current set. 8-8-8-24 @ 1600mhz vs ?-?-?-? @ 1430mhz

Also, by running 6GB - with your board, does that not take the memory out of dual channel? (The noticeable difference between single vs dual is relatively small though)

Another thing to consider is the QVL and RAM compatibility with your board, they aren't on the QVL list - but that doesn't automatically mean they won't work.

GA-H55M-USB3 (rev. 2.0) - GIGABYTE

 

[Night Hawk]

If I elected to backclock the memory presently installed here that would see the 7-7-7-30 timings at 1333 over the present 9-9-9-24. The real way to test compare both brands of memory one being the faster would be trying both sets out with only 4gb installed for each and take notes. If you elect to swap dimms note that the invalid product key notification will be seen immediately.

If you decide to run the Crucial memory you will need to perform a full clean install in order to see that activated due to the new 7 hardware profiling. I thought you would want to be aware of while deciding. I went through that when swapping OCZ memory out for the Mushkin now in use. Otherwise need to call into MS to preserve the present install.

 

[blackroseMD1]

The performance 'difference' would depend on what latencies of those kits are compared to your current set. 8-8-8-24 @ 1600mhz vs ?-?-?-? @ 1430mhz.

Also, by running 6GB - with your board, does that not take the memory out of dual channel? (The noticeable difference between single vs dual is relatively small though)

Another thing to consider is the QVL and RAM compatibility with your board, they aren't on the QVL list - but that doesn't automatically mean they won't work.

Well, the RAM I'm running right now is stock 7-7-7-20, right now it's clocked to 10-10-10-28, and yeah, running 6GB does take it out of dual channel. I'm thinking that I'm just going to go ahead and see what they send me. If it's 4GB, then I'll go ahead and run that until I can get another 4GB set sent out to me. As for the QVL...I've never actually faced a problem with that. I've swapped out memory dozens of times without looking at one, and never had an issue. I'm glad you brought it up though, as that will be the first thing to pop in my head if there are any errors after install.

If you decide to run the Crucial memory you will need to perform a full clean install in order to see that activated due to the new 7 hardware profiling. I thought you would want to be aware of while deciding. I went through that when swapping OCZ memory out for the Mushkin now in use. Otherwise need to call into MS to preserve the present install.

As for the W7 Hardware profiling...both the set I am running now, and the set that I won are Crucial. However, even if it does invalidate my W7 install, I have a Technet account, so I have plenty of keys available. Besides, I just did a fresh install, so I don't really have much to lose if I have to do another one. Thanks for the info though.

 

[Night Hawk]

That was a stickler when first seeing that here since everything was finally on the new build and running into the need for a memory change. Since you are running Crucial you may see it slide there for you without any problem. Here it was two different brands that came into it.

Upon the clean install plus now on another drive entirely the activation was immediate. A quick call in would be the option to save the present install if you had a lot on at the moment. It's all the software not the clean install of 7 that gets you!

 

[blackroseMD1]

That was a stickler when first seeing that here since everything was finally on the new build and running into the need for a memory change. Since you are running Crucial you may see it slide there for you without any problem. Here it was two different brands that came into it.

Upon the clean install plus now on another drive entirely the activation was immediate. A quick call in would be the option to save the present install if you had a lot on at the moment. It's all the software not the clean install of 7 that gets you!

Haha, yeah, that's true. I may give MS a call anyway, just to be sure. I just swapped out both my mobo and processor though, and all I had to do once I plugged the drives in was throw in another key. Better to be safe than sorry though.

 

[Night Hawk]

I could have done that with the old case but elected for the newer model case by the same brand and building this one for 7. What got me was that the first pair of dimms here was listed on Gigabyte's memory supported list showing a large number of 1.9v memory while the board called for 1.5-1.7v memory?

One question would be on the first set of dimms you have there would be if they were bought together as a 4 dimm kit or as two separate pairs? For replacing the bad dimm to see 8gb newegg still sells single dimms by themselves while matched pairs is typically preferred.

 

[smarteyeball]

Well, the RAM I'm running right now is stock 7-7-7-20, right now it's clocked to 10-10-10-28, and yeah, running 6GB does take it out of dual channel.

In that case, I'd definitely opt to lose the 2GB and go back to dual channel with tighter timings. (If they only send you a 4GB kit)

If they send you out 8GB - bonus

If the Crucial works out well, but you only receive a 4GB kit and find that you really need 8GB - the worse case scenario is that you'll have to buy another 4GB kit.

Either way, you'll end up with better performing RAM than you are currently are using.

For replacing the bad dimm to see 8gb newegg still sells single dimms by themselves while matched pairs is typically preferred.

Preferred, but not essential.

 

[Night Hawk]

True! Same brand and preferrably from the same batch at least is always a help!