Tokey Posted January 19, 2004 Posted January 19, 2004 I just ordered a Abit IC7 and 2.6C P4. I'm going to be overclocking the FSB to 250, and I'm wondering what ram will give me the best performance. I'd like to get a gig of dual channel PC4000, but my budget can't handle it I mainly play games, and am a framerate/benchmark junky. Would I be better off going with a - 1 gig PC3500 and having to run it in 5:4 (I'd never get 1:1 at 250 FSB would I?) - 1 gig PC3500 in 1:1 at 220 FSB - 512 megs PC4000 in 1:1 at 250 FSB All ram would be dual channel matched pairs. I'm sort of leaning towards the 512 megs on PC4000 since I can always add more ram down the road that way, but if performance will be better just running a gig at 220FSB (a difference of over 400mhz on the processor) or a gig in 5:4 I'll just do that. Thanks for you advice, I'm still a noob when it comes to my ram. I'll always just OC'd the FSB, but I'm going to try to run 1:1 this time around. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paranoid Posted January 19, 2004 Posted January 19, 2004 The 512MB of PC4000 will definately give you better performace. Most people will not use 1GB of RAM anyway, so the faster RAM is better. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
GTSticky Posted January 19, 2004 Posted January 19, 2004 Check the games you plan on playing. There are several which require 1GB for good performance with all of the settings cranked up (Planetside, Everquest). Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tokey Posted January 19, 2004 Posted January 19, 2004 Well I really only play Dark Age of Camelot, but I like to run 2 windowed accounts when I do, which is pretty memory intensive. Although I know a gig is recommended for this (512 is min), will more memory really equal better performace since it's going to be 50mhz slower? I wish I could test it each way before I decided what to order Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
TypicalSloan Posted January 19, 2004 Posted January 19, 2004 dont know what brand your looking at but i have the corsair xms pro pc4000 and cpu id recognizes it as pc3700, even thought its running at 260fsb 1:1. So i would get some pc3700 it should reach pc4000 speed fairly easily. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nuclear Posted January 19, 2004 Posted January 19, 2004 You could also run Pc3500 at very tight timings and have awesome performance. My PC3500 at 5:4 at 2-2-2-5 at 260FSB scores a tad higher than my PC4200 at loose timings running 1:1. It's all up to you, but 512MB of RAM should be plenty. Your right that you can always add more. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
GTSticky Posted January 19, 2004 Posted January 19, 2004 The moment you run out of RAM, you are using your hard disk to store things that should go in memory. At that instant all of your tweaked, overclocked settings don't matter a whit as your 5ns RAM turns into 8ms hard disk access. I haven't put together a machine without at least 768MB for gaming in 2 years. I recommend the 1GB setup. HL2 and Doom3 will require it.. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tokey Posted January 19, 2004 Posted January 19, 2004 (edited) Nuclear what kind of ram are you running to get 2-2-2-5? That's lower than anything I've stumbled across. I could afford a gig of PC3500 I'm thinking... I haven't really decided on what brand to get, but it'll be one of the three name brand ones, I'm not going to go cheap here. If your 4000 is being recognized as 3700 TypicalSloan, maybe I'll just go that way and overclock it up to 250fsb. It seems a bit safer than trying to stretch 3500 up to 250. Edited January 19, 2004 by Tokey Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nuclear Posted January 19, 2004 Posted January 19, 2004 I'm running Mushkin black Lvl II PC3500 at 2-2-2-5 with 3.2v on the RAM. They use BH-5 chips, so that's why they can run such low latencies. They will do 2-2-2-6 at 2.8v all day long with no problems. Mushkin has officially ran out of BH-5 chips though, so if you want some you'll have to find it at NewEgg or a place that still has it in stock. Kingston and Corsair also have BH-5 chips, but their a little harder to find. Any PC3200 or PC3500 Kingston chips without "A" on the end are BH-5. If it says "KHXPC3200A" then you've got CH-5 chips which will not do ultra low timings. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tokey Posted January 19, 2004 Posted January 19, 2004 (edited) Great, thanks for the help, I'll try to track one down today. 5:4 will force 3500 to run at 200 right, even though it's rated at 216? edit: Nevermind, I'll just overclock to 260 and that'll make 5:4 run at 216. Now the question becomes this... (I've bumped up my budget a bit) 1 gig of PC4000 Kingston at 3-4-4-8 1 gig of PC3500 Mushkin II at 2-2-2-5 Just so I have this right... even thoug it's 5:4 I'll get better performance out of the Mushkin? They're both about $300, so price isn't an issue with them. Edited January 19, 2004 by Tokey Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
smithy Posted January 19, 2004 Posted January 19, 2004 (edited) It's always better to have lower latency over speed. Meaning 2's are better than 3's and besides you want to get the BH-5's since they don't make it anymore and are running out fast. NewEgg just dropped some of their mushkin prices to get rid of their last stock. Make sure they are Level 2's not 1's. Edited January 19, 2004 by smithy Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tokey Posted January 19, 2004 Posted January 19, 2004 Just ordered a gig of the PC3500 level 2's. Thanks for all your help everyone, I'm excited to see how everything runs since I haven't upgraded since my 1.4 athlon (about 2.5 years)! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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