A64 with slow ram?

I

infiniteloop

Weaksauce
Joined
Jul 5, 2004
Messages
70
OK, so I tried not to be a complete ass and spout off a question without searching first...however, the responses I'm seeing come from both sides of the fence. I'm currently on a P4 1.6 (oc'd to 2.1), 9800pro, and 512mb of crucial 2700. I've been eyeing the a64 3000 and msi neo platinum, as that seems to be a popular "budget" combo around here.

(Side note, I realize that buying into 754 is not the most future proof choice, but I've been able to stave off the upgrade bug for quite long streches recently. This p4 setup has been my rig for over two years now. The next time around would likely be in at least another 2 years, and who knows what the situation will be at that point).

The burning question here is, will I be shooting myself in the foot by getting these 2 hot little items, yet staying with a comparatively slow set of ram sticks? On some forums I've seen people even with 3400's that have stuck with their 2700 mem. However, there are others that are saying pc3200 as the bare minimum. Another thing that doesn't help is that all the review articles have fancy high speed ram and don't even mention the slower stuff. This purchase would be painful enough on my wallet without having to plunk down another $70+ for new ram, but if it's necessary, well...... ;)
 
Well, my MSI board let's me choose options for the RAM top speed, so I can max it out at 3200, 2700, and 2100 speeds, even with my system running at 200Mhz FSB. If the new MSI board also allows that, then you're golden. Just realize you will be taking a performance hit.

I purchased new memory because for some reason my SDRAM wouldn't fit in those DDR slots, even with all the filing I did. :D
 
Should probably add...I'm not sure if these sticks are good overclockers either. Rock solid at default clock (which they should be!) but I was never able to get them much higher...could be the board though.
 
You'll take a performance hit but they'll work just fine, wether or not thats good enough for you is something that you'll have to find out for yourself. In the long run if it turns out that you didn't get a big enough speed boost by going the A64 route with the older slower RAM, then just save up and sell the older RAM to get funds to buy a stick or 2 of PC3200 which only costs about $89 or so shipped for a 512MB stick of it.
 
Update...I'm leaning more towards that 3000 and neo plat combo every day ;) And I guess mesyn191 is right, I can always upgrade to better ram later...as if jumping to an a64 wouldn't be enough of a boost, heh.

Side note though: has the mysterious alternate A64 sku at newegg been explained with any certainty? It's referenced over here >> www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=772025 and I'd like to think that it is indeed the way they are notating the CG revisions, but it just seems odd to me. Would be an nice easy way to increase oc potential, but hardly anyone's reviewed it.
 
I bought a similar combo in march and love it so far. I got some p3200 cl2.5 ram and it rans fast enough for my movie watching, game playing, enconding, etc. needs...

Im kinda out of the loop about 754 mobos though. Is the MSI board you mention nf3 250 or k8t800 pro. If not, you should consider one packing either reference model.

The pci/agp lock will come in handy
 
Actually, it might not be as large a performance hit as you fear. The cache and memory controller work well on the A64. They will minimize the effect of your relatively slow memory. Remember any memory is slow compared to cache.
 
Hmm, I seem to have a 512 stick of corsair value select in my shopping cart... how did that get there?? :)
 
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