which is faster 2 dimms or 1 dimm

CyberJunk

CyberJunk

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which is faster 2x4 gb dimms or 1 8gb dimm ?

running on a z68 motherboard.
 
All things being equal (speed, timings, etc.), 2x4gb would be faster. It would be faster because it would run in dual channel. With only one dimm you can't run dual channel.
 
2x4GB CL 9 1866mhz Vs CL 10 1866mhz or 2x4GB CL9 vs 1x8GB CL10 1866mhz?
 
2x 4 gb CL9 1866mhz dimm kit vs 1 8gb 1600mhz CL10 dimm

which is faster and offers the best performance

running 2600k on a z68 chipset.
 
the lower the latency(cl# and the " # -- # -- # " ratings are delay and lower is nearly always better) at the higher mhz is better, if you have 4 slots, 2 sticks in the separate banks = dual channel is safer than 4 sticks since you have less connections to cause problems, only exception is if you have a board that supports tripple or quad channel (generalization here) which you would want to have at least one stick in each channel/bank, if you only have two slots then use 2 sticks

the more populated channels the better but limiting to one stick per channel is safer(2 sticks for dual channel, 3 sticks for tri-channel, 4 sticks for quad channel, regardless of the actual number of slots open)

the amount of ram in GB should have little or no effect unless the timings are actually marked as higher, if the timings are the same, then 4g per stick should perform the same if not better than 2gb per stick if the speed in mhz is the same and the timings are the same (4gb could only perform better because you have more in total GB the actual bandwidth should not change since that is not dependant on the size, but the timing and speed in mhz)

make sense ?


short answer 2x4gb would probably be faster unless that 1x8gb is made of magical faster than all other ram
 
dual channel vs single = double the speed so no matter what your single stick speed is it wont matter dual will beat it as you will want to match the FSB of the processor.

you wont notice Cl9 to CL10 except in benchmarks.

you answered your own question the 2 x4 has faster speed and better CL.
 
dual channel is faster.. but if you can buy the 1x8gb now and another 1x8gb in the future (better investement in the long run)
 
^the 64bit barrier really limits the uses of 16gb ram to not much other than running a lot VM's and maybe one or two programs. 8GB is more than enough.
 
well iam selling my corsair vengence DDR3 1600mhz 2 x 4gb kit to a local friend and iam headed to microcenter tommrow they had a sale on ram and i was going to pick up either the corsair vengenance 1866mhz CL9 2x 4gb kit for $69.99 or the corsair vengence 1x 8gb dimm 1600mhz CL10 for $99

but it sounds like the 1866mhz kit will be faster
 
Binar said:
dual channel is faster.. but if you can buy the 1x8gb now and another 1x8gb in the future (better investement in the long run)
Click to expand...

i would rather wait for the price to come down and the timings to get tighter. right now i need speed over capacity. i don't really need 16gb of ram as i just mainily play games and browse the web and do light office work. iam looking for the fastest setup
 
Neither dual channel, nor higher freq, nor lower latency will bring you much real world benefit. Buy the cheapest option with longest warranty and/or the one better for future upgrades.
 
^ Ram always has a lifetime warranty from any name brand.

That 2x 4gb kit would be faster in every aspect (more mhz, lower latency, dual channel). But there may be cheaper options available.
 
blackhand1001 said:
^the 64bit barrier really limits the uses of 16gb ram to not much other than running a lot VM's and maybe one or two programs. 8GB is more than enough.
Click to expand...

If you ever start using Photoshop CS5 64bit and you're working with high res TIF, PSD or RAW files....you'll wish you had more than 8GB. :D Trust me.

Yes, most apps don't benefit from an overabundance of available RAM. When you're using pro-level apps (ie quite a few of the CS5 variety, from Ps to After Effects and Premiere)....the more the ram, the better. But (to be fair)....offloading some of that work to a CUDA-capable GPU and having a RAMdisk or a fast drive as a scratch disk....all of those options are also important when you're working with big stuff like that. :)

That being said - I like being able to give a VM 4+ GB of RAM or knowing that I can run ridiculous stuff in Ps64 (giving it 8GB of RAM) in my 2600K/P67/16GB workstation. :)
 
dual channel is usually better, but If you wanna make a ram disk I would go for capacity and that would mean higher density sticks.
 
i am going to guess you wont even notice the speed difference from say 1066 to 1800, except n benchmarks.
 
blackhand1001 said:
^the 64bit barrier really limits the uses of 16gb ram to not much other than running a lot VM's and maybe one or two programs. 8GB is more than enough.
Click to expand...

No, 8GB is not more than enough, that's your opinion, not fact.

Serious video editing requires 16GB+ at a minimum, especially with HD content.
Also, 64-bit does not stop one from having more than 16GB, that's normally a physical motherboard limitation.

You do realize their are systems out there capable of 1TB+ of RAM, right?

Another thing, 16GB doesn't allow for a lot of VMs, it depends on the VMs running and how much memory is allocated to them.
4GB is very necessary on many VMs, and 16GB wouldn't even allow four to run without decreasing the memory per VM.
 
Don't sweat over this. Either way you go you'll likely not notice any difference in performance unless your running creativity software that heavily hits ram. And of course in synthetic benchmarks. I would also go for the 4x2 though for dual channel.
 
it seems like sandybridge benefits over higher speed ram rather than timings
 
Correct. The priority when buying ram should be Dual / Triple channel set (based on motherboard), price and a manufacturer you trust, GB capacity, higher frequency, then an average or lower CAS latency at that frequency.

CAS latency and Frequency are more noticeable when you're not running in Dual or Triple channel. Comparing nanosecond delays vs running 2-3 operations per pass (not exactly how it works but that is the basic idea when talking about Memory Bandwidth). Frequency can still improve the throughput of Dual or Triple channel sets, but you're less likely to notice the difference.
 
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bigdogchris said:
Don't sweat over this. Either way you go you'll likely not notice any difference in performance unless your running creativity software that heavily hits ram. And of course in synthetic benchmarks. I would also go for the 4x2 though for dual channel.
Click to expand...

Running multiple VMs will feel pain from not having enough memory bandwidth allocated to system memory.

If you're running in single channel, VMs will start to become noticeably slower, even if running off of a SSD.
 
iam gonna run 2 x 4gb dual channel at 2133mhz at 10-10-10-28 timings
 
Red Falcon said:
Running multiple VMs will feel pain from not having enough memory bandwidth allocated to system memory.

If you're running in single channel, VMs will start to become noticeably slower, even if running off of a SSD.
Click to expand...

That would depend on what's running in them. Any benchmark links?
 
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