[razor_edge]

I have a question. I have 4 gigs of ram running in my system. While running the 4 gigs at once i can't get the 1T timing. Only when i use just 2 gigs can i get the 1T timing. Benchmarking with SiSoftware Sandra while using 2 gigs at 1T gives me a bandwidth of 5700 mb/s. With the 4 gigs at 2T i get about 5400 mb/s. I was wondering for gaming which would be more beneficial? Does the extra 300 mb/s make a big difference in performance at all?

[razor_edge]

Nobody can help? I know it might be a stupid question but i'm not exactly a ram expert lol.

[McTimson]

I highly doubt you'll be able to tell the difference. If a benchmark specific to testing memory only shows a 5% difference, then the game will show even less. There are so many other factors that affect gaming performance that are much more important than memory bandwidth, it's not worth it to go with that little of a speed increase over size.

Go with the 4GB. You have Vista, so it's a memory hog anyway, the 4GB will greatly outweigh any benefits from having slightly faster 2GB.

[Mayor Quimby]

Originally Posted by McTimson

I highly doubt you'll be able to tell the difference. If a benchmark specific to testing memory only shows a 5% difference, then the game will show even less. There are so many other factors that affect gaming performance that are much more important than memory bandwidth, it's not worth it to go with that little of a speed increase over size.

Go with the 4GB. You have Vista, so it's a memory hog anyway, the 4GB will greatly outweigh any benefits from having slightly faster 2GB.

Gotta Agree with him.

[Gulo Luseus]

The 2T timings are better, even though you have a theoretically lower bandwidth. With 2 mem sticks, running in dual mode, the gap betwen writes/reads is 1T, so it writes to alternate sticks. With 4 mem sticks, you are using dual mode twice, meaning that it writes to 1 stick in first set, then 1 stick in second set, alternating, so you get a 1,3,2,4 sequence. In terms of actual performance, with 2 sticks the timings are usually slightly higher than 1T, as the memory, being volatile, has to be read then written or rewritten. As such, the operation has to be concluded before the second stick can be written to, leading to a slightly higher latency. With 4 mem sticks, the write to stick 1 does not have to be completed before the write to stick 3 commences, which means that 2T timings are slightly quicker. for gaming, or indeed any application whatsoever, you will have a higher throughput on 4 stick than 2 stick. The minor loss of bandwidth is more than made up for by the faster write speed.
It will also serve to produce less ram errors, as the memory volatility is being changed less often, and th einformation has a chance to be concluded before being reused

[razor_edge]

I guess it's unanimous then, i'll keep using all 4 gigs. Thanks for the insight guys.