some ram questions

djshowdowndjshowdown London
edited October 2005 in Hardware
i have a D875PBZ motherboard

how much ram can it support?

how much ram is it worth having?

i currently have 1gb

muchos gracias :thumbsup:

Comments

  • GrayFoxGrayFox /dev/urandom Member
    edited October 2005
    4X1gb sticks.
    And once you pass 1gb theres rarely a noticeable diffrence.
  • djshowdowndjshowdown London
    edited October 2005
    past 1gb theres no difference?

    even if im playing games and running resource hogging audio programs? (cubase sx 3, reason 3 etc)

    im confused

    ppl in another thread were talking about how it does make a real big difference
  • tmh88tmh88 Pittsburgh / Athens, OH
    edited October 2005
    Yea it doesnt do much once you get over 1-1.5 gigs of ram. You can tell a difference in very power hungry programs such as CAD, or digital editing and that type of stuff.

    If your strictly using it for gaming i wouldnt suggest going over 1.5 gigs of ram. Its your money, do what you think.

    Ok and yes it will make a big difference if you go from having like 256mb to a gig, or even 768mb which i have now (because my other gig stick died :mad: ). how much ram do you have now?
  • djstubbsdjstubbs NJ
    edited October 2005
    GrayFox wrote:
    4X1gb sticks.
    And once you pass 1gb theres rarely a noticeable diffrence.

    I think you meant 2GB. :D
  • djshowdowndjshowdown London
    edited October 2005
    well the programs i use are notorious for being very ram hungry

    i just wanna make sure that 2gb or more wont just be overkill
  • Straight_ManStraight_Man Geeky, in my own way Naples, FL Icrontian
    edited October 2005
    I run 1 GB each on two 3 GHz boxes herehere, do digital photo editting and other things simultaneously. I'm thinking of going to 2 GB myself, but only a real heavy computer like Short-Media's server that supports hundreds of web sessions simultaneously needs more than 2 GB(It has 4 GB RAM in it).

    Won't be lots faster compared to doing just one thing for that one thing, with more RAM. BUT, you will be able to do more at once at decent speeds with 2 GB in the box. I would not bother going over 2 GB unless you are really hogging lots of RAM with several apps running at once almost all the time.

    Think about how fast a CPU you have, also. In my case, it is RAM holding things up, but if you have a slow CPU the only thing you will get with 2 GB is very minor speed changes and more STABILITY with several RAM-Hungry things running at once on your computer. Thus, if you have a slower CPU it might be better to see what a faster one costs, up to 3 GHz in speed, FIRST-- then add RAM later. I KNOW your chipset, with latest BIOS FLash, will take a CPU that is close to or equal to 3 GHz in speed. Although I run Asus mobo, same chipset here.
  • djshowdowndjshowdown London
    edited October 2005
    maybe i should post up my computer specs


    pentium 4 3.00ghz with HT
    1ghz ddr400 ram
    80gb hard drive partitioned into 20gb (c drive) and 60gb (d drive)
    2 x 120 gb sata hard drives (were running as raid but i split them)
    radeon 7000 graphics card
    edirol da 2496 sound card with breakout box
    nec nd2500a dvd-r/rw
    intel D875PBZ motherboard

    if theres anything ive missed that would be useful for you then let me know :)
  • Skip-Da-ShuSkip-Da-Shu Republic of Texas, Central
    edited October 2005
    One other factor you might consider... many mobo chipsets will run 2 sticks of memory at 1T command rate but require going to 2T with 4 sticks! I've seen the slowdown in the sandra bandwidth tests using 4 x256 memory vs 2 x 512 with the same timings.

    Edited to correct, had listed the mem config backwards! Sry.
  • QeldromaQeldroma Arid ZoneAh Member
    edited October 2005
    DJ, I remember the day when I thought 32MB was more than anyone would ever need. Now you can't even load XP with that.

    Upgrading is not a bad idea and another stick of memory isn't going to consume near as much power as, say, a newer model video card (I noticed that yours is pretty ancient by current standards). More and more applications will grow into more memory.
    djshowdown wrote:
    radeon 7000 graphics card
    But I'm not sure in your case that there are many applications that would require that much memory could even use your video card. Perhaps that is the area you want to focus on for improvement if anything? It depends on what you are doing with your system.
  • djshowdowndjshowdown London
    edited October 2005
    well to be honest im playing things like red alert 2

    i was actually thinkin of upgrading the graphics card as i had a feeling it was pretty dated

    then again my computers main priority is music production

    can anyone recommend a decent pair of 1gb ram sticks and also a good (not amazingly spectacular) graphics card

    thanks
  • QeldromaQeldroma Arid ZoneAh Member
    edited October 2005
    djshowdown wrote:
    well to be honest im playing things like red alert 2

    i was actually thinkin of upgrading the graphics card as i had a feeling it was pretty dated

    then again my computers main priority is music production

    can anyone recommend a decent pair of 1gb ram sticks and also a good (not amazingly spectacular) graphics card

    thanks

    I don't think additional memory is going to make that much difference in your case then. But if you wish to evolve from Red Alert, go for the video card. :)

    ADDED: How much are you willing to spend for a video card?
  • djshowdowndjshowdown London
    edited October 2005
    Skip Da Shu wrote:
    One other factor you might consider... many mobo chipsets will run 2 sticks of memory at 1T command rate but require going to 2T with 4 sticks! I've seen the slowdown in the sandra bandwidth tests using 2 x 512 vs 4 x256 memory with the same timings.

    so are you saying that it may be faster if i use 4x512 mb sticks as oppsed to 2x1gb sticks?
  • Skip-Da-ShuSkip-Da-Shu Republic of Texas, Central
    edited October 2005
    djshowdown wrote:
    so are you saying that it may be faster if i use 4x512 mb sticks as oppsed to 2x1gb sticks?
    No, just the opposite, it is faster to use 2 sticks instead of 4... sorry I boogered up my post, have fixed it now.
    -- Skip
  • djshowdowndjshowdown London
    edited October 2005
    okay

    i had planned to get two 1gb sticks

    so can anyone recommend a decent pair?

    im in uk if that makes a difference (ie i probably wont be purchasing from newegg like nearly everyone off here seems to!)

    also can anyone recommend a few good graphics cards in different price ranges?

    i need to know what im gonna get for my money before i decide how much i wanna spend :thumbsup:
  • scottscott Medina, Ohio Icrontian
    edited October 2005
    hey Dj

    I am running the same mobo and processor in my main rig. It has been rock solid for 2 years now. I originally had 1 gig (2x 512) and that was fine. I also fold on this box and when the QMD cores came out they really started bogging down the machine. I had 2 spare 512 sticks for another project and put them in this box. now 2 gigs 4 x 512. My Sandra memory benchmarks did drop a bit but now I can run most anything without shutting down my 2 folding clients. I do a lot of CAD work and video encoding. It goes a lot smoother with 2 gigs.

    The QMD cores really hog the memory.With two clients running and sitting at desktop I am using over 700MB of memory.


    Scott
    mem.JPG 15.6K
  • djshowdowndjshowdown London
    edited October 2005
    well i have two instances of f@h running at all times

    im gonna get 2 gb

    just need help deciding which sticks now

    hint hint ;)
  • Skip-Da-ShuSkip-Da-Shu Republic of Texas, Central
    edited October 2005
    djshowdown wrote:
    okay

    i had planned to get two 1gb sticks

    so can anyone recommend a decent pair?

    im in uk if that makes a difference (ie i probably wont be purchasing from newegg like nearly everyone off here seems to!)

    also can anyone recommend a few good graphics cards in different price ranges?

    i need to know what im gonna get for my money before i decide how much i wanna spend :thumbsup:

    Of the various memory brands I currently own or have owned (Patriot, Kingston, Kingtech, A-Pacer, Corsair, OCZ and who knows what else) the best has been the OCZ.

    Can't help you with the Graphics card as I haven't been following those.
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