Overclocking Memory?

[lt_wentoncha]

Howdy all,

On a Bloomfield i7 9x0 (920-960), according to Intel the processor can handle RAM speeds up to DDR3 1066. Does this mean that buying any higher spec RAM is wasteful (ie DDR3 1600), particularly since those types of sticks will run with higher timings? At any rate, since the processor appears to be the bottleneck, it really wouldn't matter if a board can handle faster speeds (again, like DDR3 1600), would it?

Thanks.

Proc: i7 920 SLBCH D0 Stepping (Stock ATM)
Mobo: GIGABYTE GA-X58A-UD5
Mem: G.SKILL PI Series 6GB DDR3 1600 (Stock ATM)
HDD: Crucial C300 128 GB + 1 TB Hitatchi
GFX: 2x 570 EVGA 025-P3-1579-AR GeForce GTX 570
PSU: Corsair TX950w
OS: Win7 Ultimate

 

[Arcus]

I don't think its wasteful, Imho I would go for at least 1600Mhz mem if you plan to OC your 920, That would let you get the cpu up to 4Ghz without pushing the memory out of spec, and memory is pretty cheap atm.

Plus if you run 1600Mhz rated memory at 1066 you would be able to tighten up the timings quite a bit, so you're not losing anything there.

As for the MoBo I guess it depends on if you plan on Oc'ing, if you aren't and you want faster memory a MoBo that can do 1600Mhz memory would be nice, If you are going to OC the cpu having a MoBo that can do 1600 isn't as important as having a Mobo that can do a high Bclock.

Hope that makes sense