Vista Performance Rating with more than 4GB of ram

tesfaye

2[H]4U
Joined
Apr 17, 2003
Messages
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I noticed something strange, my system originally scored 5.9 with 4GB of ram 2X2GB and 4X1GB configurations. Now I noticed after upgrading my motherboard and adding 2GB of spare ram to go with my 4GB of 2X2GB sticks I now get a 5.2 in the memory test. I checked Everest and the memory read test reports 8167MB/s at DDR2-712 5-5-5-17 CR2.

The machine is fine otherwise and runs great but I kinda like seeing 5.9 in my rating. :) Anyone else notice this in their systems?
 
Considering that the chance of you using 6gb of ram in this day in age in a home setting is zero, go back to 4gb and get that 5.9 back.
 
Any chance the RAM is running at a slower speed?
You say DDR2-712.... Most boards run DDR2-800 at least...!
 
Any chance the RAM is running at a slower speed?
You say DDR2-712.... Most boards run DDR2-800 at least...!
 
Considering that the chance of you using 6gb of ram in this day in age in a home setting is zero, go back to 4gb and get that 5.9 back.

more and more "home" users are starting to use memory intensive software like vmware for safe web surfing and testing out suspicious software (or using trial software indefinitely with the help of snapshots lol)... going beyond that 4gb limit is really not that unheard of anymore
 
Considering that the chance of you using 6gb of ram in this day in age in a home setting is zero, go back to 4gb and get that 5.9 back.

LOL. No.

Any chance the RAM is running at a slower speed?
You say DDR2-712.... Most boards run DDR2-800 at least...!

Most likely he's using a RAM divider in the BIOS for overclocking reasons.

As far as your rating going down: did you use a single 2GB stick or two 1GB sticks when you went to 6GB total? If you used one stick, then you're no longer running in dual channel, which could account for the hit to your Windows Experience.

Config 1:

DimmA: 2GB Stick
DimmB: 2GB Stick
DimmC: 2GB Stick
DimmD: none

vs.

Config 2:

DimmA: 2GB Stick
DimmB: 1GB Stick
DimmC: 2GB Stick
DimmD: 1GB Stick

The latter being dual channel.
 
bigdogchris said:
Considering that the chance of you using 6gb of ram in this day in age in a home setting is zero, go back to 4gb and get that 5.9 back.
Software development, SQL, virtual machines, encoding, games. 6GB most certainly comes in handy.

Menelmarar said:
Any chance the RAM is running at a slower speed?
You say DDR2-712.... Most boards run DDR2-800 at least...!
I'm OC'ing my chip to 3.2 with the RAM linked and synced. I've scored 5.9 at DDR2-667 with default settings.

bicycle_wreck said:
Most likely he's using a RAM divider in the BIOS for overclocking reasons.

As far as your rating going down: did you use a single 2GB stick or two 1GB sticks when you went to 6GB total? If you used one stick, then you're no longer running in dual channel, which could account for the hit to your Windows Experience.

Config 1:

DimmA: 2GB Stick
DimmB: 2GB Stick
DimmC: 2GB Stick
DimmD: none

vs.

Config 2:

DimmA: 2GB Stick
DimmB: 1GB Stick
DimmC: 2GB Stick
DimmD: 1GB Stick

The latter being dual channel.
I'm running the ram in the right slots. I'm running Config 2. The board reads 128bit for the memory. Everest noted the fact that the ram is running in Dual channel mode. My ram scores were better than a Core 2 Duo @ 2.6Ghz running DDR2-800 with the same timings in Everest. I'm going to yank the ram out to test with the 2 sticks again. It's just a score, right guys?.... right? :( Just when I thought I shook the habit of worrying about benchmark scores (Never as bad as those 3DMark lovers, no offense). :D

aerosolfaith said:
confusuing.....lol....
Indeed.
 
Well after a couple hours worth of testing, I'm up to 5.3 (whoopee :rolleyes: ). Im running the 6GB config with 4-4-4-12 2T timings at 712MHz DDR2.

So I've noted the following:

The Geil sticks are faster than the Crucial ram at the same settings when running the matched pairs by themselves.
Running them together gets a score in between what they would score individualy. The Geil at 667 5-5-5-15 scored 5.4 and the Ballistix 5.0.

Something is different about this 780i because with the same processor at 3.0Ghz DDR2 667 on the 680i I scored 5.9 with 2 and 4 sticks of Ballistix ram and 2X2GB sticks of Geil Evo One. I'm wondering if one of the differences between the 680i and 780i are timings for the chipset.

That's about all the time I'm going to spend on it unless someone knows what the issue is and how to fix it. I've got games to finish! :)

Edit: Ok, I lied I had to try one more thing. I lowered my Command Rate to 1T and raised the voltage from 1.9 to 1.95 and tried again. I scored a 5.8.
 
going beyond that 4gb limit is really not that unheard of anymore
I guarantee that unless someone is gaming, your not going to use 4gb of ram in a home environment by just surfing the web or using word, like what the majority of home users do. Vista might SuperFetch and fill up 4gb, but that doesn't mean it's being currently used.

Anyways, I could run a bunch of unnecessary virus scanners, 6 fire walls, proxy ghost surfers, 3 male ware dynamic scanners and have a dozen items in the notification area too. That doesn't mean that I should be using all that ram.
 
I guarantee that unless someone is gaming, your not going to use 4gb of ram in a home environment by just surfing the web or using word, like what the majority of home users do. Vista might SuperFetch and fill up 4gb, but that doesn't mean it's being currently used.

Anyways, I could run a bunch of unnecessary virus scanners, 6 fire walls, proxy ghost surfers, 3 male ware dynamic scanners and have a dozen items in the notification area too. That doesn't mean that I should be using all that ram.

Its a choice. If someone wants 8GBs of RAM and has the money to achieve that goal, then why stand in their way? Trying to rationalize its usage from either point of view is not very productive.

I remember when I built my first system with 1GB of RAM and everyone said the exact same things you just did. This is [H], and overkill is always welcome.

Windows Performance Rating means even less than 3DMark.

Exactly. Its a non-issue.
 
Its a choice. If someone wants 8GBs of RAM and has the money to achieve that goal, then why stand in their way? Trying to rationalize its usage from either point of view is not very productive.

I remember when I built my first system with 1GB of RAM and everyone said the exact same things you just did. This is [H], and overkill is always welcome.
I never said not to use 4gb of ram.
 
Indeed, i had a 5.7 with 2gb, and with 8, i got a 5.9, and my cpu limits my score to a 5.4.
edit: the ram cost me $200 total, it was worth it.
 
NKDietrich said:
Windows Performance Rating means even less than 3DMark.
You're right it isn't. I don't know if your remark was targeted at me but if it was, re-read my original post. I noticed something odd after making a configuration change and wondered if anyone else noticed the same. This wasn't a "Help me score XXX amount of points more in {benchmark}" thread.

@bicycle_wreck:
4GB of ram would have been ok for me but I had 2 extra sticks of ram laying around so I just popped them in. It's an old habit.

In any event, regardless of benchmark scores, the computer is running great, it's prime stable and I'm not crashing while playing games or during while working so I'm a happy camper.
 
@bicycle_wreck:
4GB of ram would have been ok for me but I had 2 extra sticks of ram laying around so I just popped them in. It's an old habit.

I would have done the same. There's no such thing as too much RAM--in my opinion. I'm glad you have it all up-and-running. ;)
 
There's no such thing as too much anything. Once you have more of it u just end up finding ways to make use of it. It's like a buffet :)

Memory is so inexpensive now that the cost of all that memory is a moot point. The argument would be different if we were talking about DDR3 memory. Any good ddr2 vs ddr3 threads here? :)
 
i got 8gb and turned off the damn swap file. oh and my vista memory score (which means nothing) is 5.9
 
i wish i had 6 gigs of ram...

I had four in my box and vista liked to allocate it to every application it thought I would run. God that drove me nuts.
 
There's no such thing as too much anything. Once you have more of it u just end up finding ways to make use of it. It's like a buffet :)

Memory is so inexpensive now that the cost of all that memory is a moot point. The argument would be different if we were talking about DDR3 memory. Any good ddr2 vs ddr3 threads here? :)
Although, DDR3 prices are falling fairly quickly, it may not quite reach the lows of current DDR2 memory but I have a feeling it seems like it could get pretty close in a few months.
 
Wondering whats a good program for testing ram for errors under vista 64bit?
Just grab a copy of Memtest which you can boot off a CD or use the built in memory checker. You can run it from the boot menu. I hear that test is pretty good as well.
 
Well after a couple hours worth of testing, I'm up to 5.3 (whoopee :rolleyes: ). Im running the 6GB config with 4-4-4-12 2T timings at 712MHz DDR2.

So I've noted the following:

The Geil sticks are faster than the Crucial ram at the same settings when running the matched pairs by themselves.
Running them together gets a score in between what they would score individualy. The Geil at 667 5-5-5-15 scored 5.4 and the Ballistix 5.0.

You will never see 5.9 with memory rated at 667. You won't even see it with 800. The windows experience score is based on the speed of the ram. This includes latencies and bandwidth.

I see in one of your other posts that you received a everest reading of 8167MB/s. I find that hard to believe with the memory speeds you say you are using.
 
The Windows Experience RAM score seems to be partially FSB-dependent for me: when running my RAM at 800MHz with the FSB at 1066MHz, I got 5.6. With the RAM at the same speed/latencies but the FSB at 1333MHz, that went up to 5.9.
 
spartus4, you are pretty much saying that I'm losing it at the age of 32. Since I have some free time on my hands since the ladies of the house have gone to sleep, I took the Crucial ram out and left the GeIL ram in and ran the performance tool and Everest just to make sure that I'm not imagining anything. I did this at 667 and 712.

You will never see 5.9 with memory rated at 667.

667Results.jpg


You won't even see it with 800.
712MhzResults.jpg


The windows experience score is based on the speed of the ram. This includes latencies and bandwidth.

I see in one of your other posts that you received a everest reading of 8167MB/s. I find that hard to believe with the memory speeds you say you are using.
Well, past performance numbers and the current ones I've just posted say otherwise. I don't know why it's hard to believe. Dropping the timings made a difference and then 1T gave an even bigger boost. Not that any of this matters in real world performance but the difference is there.

So this tells me that 1)my latencies were lower in my original configuration and I overlooked that fact and 2) mixing the ram can and does impact performance in a negative manner, enough that Vista performance tool will notice which was the point of my original post. My assumption was additional memory although a different brand that the currently installed memory with fixed timings in the BIOS would result in the same performance, but that doesn't seem to be the case.

Edit: Raised the FSB to 715 and got my beloved 5.9 back. Everest reports 9238MB on the memory read test. Ok, time to load up Newsleecher and grab some pr0n at 50Mb/s.
 
I guarantee that unless someone is gaming, your not going to use 4gb of ram in a home environment by just surfing the web or using word, like what the majority of home users do. Vista might SuperFetch and fill up 4gb, but that doesn't mean it's being currently used.

Anyways, I could run a bunch of unnecessary virus scanners, 6 fire walls, proxy ghost surfers, 3 male ware dynamic scanners and have a dozen items in the notification area too. That doesn't mean that I should be using all that ram.

He's using Vista, Vista has super fetch which itself will use any ram you are not actively occupying and make the system much more responsive. The "you won't ever use that ram" holds far less weight in Vista than it did in XP.

I've attached a pic of my task manager. Out of the 8GB I've got, only 96MB is free. (only 9MB now as I'm typing this)

memusage.jpg
 
more and more "home" users are starting to use memory intensive software like vmware for safe web surfing and testing out suspicious software (or using trial software indefinitely with the help of snapshots lol)... going beyond that 4gb limit is really not that unheard of anymore

Hell with the way Firefox memory leaks go sometimes, almost anyone could feel hampered by a 'mere' 2gb... :eek: I think I see a 500gb Firefox instance on my machine 'least once a week, where art thou FF3?!

I think memory's actually a bigger hang-up for multi-tasking than dual/quad-cores are sometimes.
 
Hell with the way Firefox memory leaks go sometimes, almost anyone could feel hampered by a 'mere' 2gb... :eek: I think I see a 500gb Firefox instance on my machine 'least once a week, where art thou FF3?!

I think memory's actually a bigger hang-up for multi-tasking than dual/quad-cores are sometimes.
If there is one thing I love the most about having those 6gigs in there is that I can jump in and out of a game with shit-ton of other programs running and not have to worry about memory paging from the disk. It's so quick. I really like that. Next is the ability to run VMs with more than 512MB and have more than enough memory left over for other tasks.
 
It depends on the RAM. I have 2 1GB sticks of OCZ PC6400 that get a 5.9. Two 1GB sticks of Kingston at the same speed get a 5.2 on the same board. Most people outside these kind of forums don't know what RAM is. If you need 6 or 8 GB or RAM, you will know. If you don't know, it doesn't matter. :D
 
It's pretty surprising how gimped a lot of OEM systems get thrown out the door with regards to RAM though... Even as cheap as it is, I STILL see a lot of systems out there with 1GB and even 512MB in many cases, systems running Vista no less, laptops in particular...

I don't think 1GB was normal for basic systems 'till recently even, a lot of people are shocked when for $30-40 I pop an extra stick or two of RAM in their system and it's suddenly so much more responsive...

It's a shame you can't really do that for a lot of older systems that are running XP and 512MB of DDR1 or less (or worse, PC133 SDRAM), any non-enthusiast could get a lot more use out of such a system w/a simple RAM upgrade but DDR and SDRAM are now cost-prohibitive since they're not in production.

People with that kinda problem end up buying a new system w/Vista instead and still end up w/o enough memory, heh, endless cycle.
 
I was going to get more ram for an AMD 939 system I have running as a server but I was not going to pay $89 per GB. I left it with 1GB of ram (4x256MB). I wonder how long it will be before DDR2 is somewhat phased out.
 
I don't think 1GB was normal for basic systems 'till recently even, a lot of people are shocked when for $30-40 I pop an extra stick or two of RAM in their system and it's suddenly so much more responsive...

Back in 06 the average Dell came with 256 MB. Toward the end of that year they started putting 1GB in some of them.
 
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