Ello everyone, I need to buy 2x 4GB ram modules and was (almost) surprised to see how expensive it still is for DDR2 800 mhz crucial ram after all these years (about £130!). I know that really cheap ram used to be available and I always heeded the advice to at least go with crucial rather than buying something crap, so I would like to avoid anything of that nature. I've been searching about and found some IBM ram going for about £60. Does anybody know what there ram is like? Here's the link. http://www.m4store.co.uk/ibm-8192mb...-ddr2-ecc-cl6-vlp-rdimm-46c0510-p-121561.html Thanks.
That's quite expensive, just as expensive as DDR3. You can find cheaper here at a US dealer: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...ption=&Ntk=&CFG=&SpeTabStoreType=&srchInDesc= Never had IBM memory... but i can tell you that the manufacturer for memory isn't as important as the specs of the stick. You want memory with low cas latency and high frequency (speed ie 800). Also, that IBM memory is RDIMM (registered memory) which probably won't fit in your motherboard. Notice how it has 2 notches instead of 1 like mainstream SDRAM memory. I know i haven't answered your question but i hope i helped
That answers my question thanks, because I no longer want to buy that ram! Thanks for letting me know. Basically I have 2 x 2gb crucial DDR2 800, and 2 slots left on the motherboard. I thought that for about £60 I could have 10gb of ram, but evidently not! Is it still better to buy 2 x 2gb, rather than one single 4gb to occupy those slots? Cheers for the info.
Most welcome Yes, definitely 2x2GB because you'll utilize dual channel that way as opposed to having 1 stick. If you already have 2x2GB then you're already setup as Dual Channel. Adding another 2x2GB will do nothing but add 4GB to your memory
^Well basically, I was rather looking forward to having 10gb of memory (2gb already there + 8gb of IBM ram for £60), however, it's now looking like I'd pay double that. Because of this it looks like I'll probably buy 4gb, but I'd quite like to leave the extra slot, in case I ever fancy sticking in another 4gb. Would simply sticking one 4gb stick in one of the rams slots actually hamper the potential performance that much? Thanks again.
You see, a common misconception buyers have when purchasing memory is "the more RAM, the faster/better". The average gamer barely uses even 4gGB! But somehow, 12GB bundles are selling like crazy... Unless you're running a server, there really is no need for over 8GB of memory. In your case, another 4GB won't hurt, but ask yourself "how much am I really using?" You can run task manager under heavy program or game loads and check just how much memory is being used up. That's a good start. One important thing i should've mentioned earlier to aid your decision is, whether you buy 1x4GB or 2x2GB, it is very important that stick/sticks have the same speeds as memory currently installed. So, since you have DDR2 800, get DDR2800. Your motherboard sets the memory speed for your system based on the lowest frequency currently installed. So if you have 2 sticks of DDR2 800 and 2 sticks of DDR2 667, you'll be running at 667 speeds. Conversly, if you buy memory with higher speeds than the memory currently installed, you'll be running at speeds of your current memory. This might be a smart buy if you plan on installing this faster memory in another system in the future. Just remember that for your current system, it'll run at the lower, DDR2 800 speeds. So, adding 1 stick of 4GB won't hamper your system as long as it's speed is higher than DDR2 800 or the same.
Well I use Ableton Live for producing music, and my computer is really struggling on some of my projects. Assuming an extra 2gb would roughly double the amount of virtual instruments I can load, I think I'd definitely need a lot more than that! I quite fancy DDR3 ram considering how cheap it is, but I can only install a maximum of 4gb on this motherboard. Decisions decisions...
In that case yes, get that upgrade! I know what its like rendering media files... I used to use After Effects as a novice and it took up a lot of memory to render a file. But how did you plan on using 10GB if your mb only supports up to 4!?
