Upgrading RAM

Discussion in 'Hardware' started by hegemon875, Dec 3, 2007.

  1. hegemon875

    hegemon875 Private First Class

    Right now Ive got two 1 gig sticks of PC2-4300 dd2 dimm sdram at 266 MHz and am planning to upgrade to This.

    Will the improvment be worth the cost? I dont have more than $100 to spend and cant order anything online (no credit card :(). Would buying another stick of RAM instead of upgrading my existing 2 gigs be better for gaming?
     
  2. dlb

    dlb MajorGeek

    Yes. I doubt you'd notice any change by getting faster RAM.

    And welcome to MajorGeeks! :major
     
  3. hegemon875

    hegemon875 Private First Class

    Ok then looks like Ill be getting another 1 gig stick then.

    Now I know that if I buy a faster stick of ram it willl underclock to match the slower ram that I already have installed. But besides that will mixing faster and slower ram cause any damage to my motherboard?

    Also thanks for the welcome! :)
     
  4. dlb

    dlb MajorGeek

    Different speeds will do exactly as you say: the faster speeds will clock down to run equal with the slower speeds.... and no. You will not do any damage to the motherboard by running different speeds of memory. The worst thing that will happen is either the PC won't boot and will start beeping all crazy, or it just won't recognize all the RAM. But both of these two scenarios are quite rare; I don't foresee any problems....
     
  5. Wyatt_Earp

    Wyatt_Earp MajorGeek

    Honestly, I don't think you'll see any increase in performance in going from 2Gb to 3Gb. 2 is plenty to run any game out there.

    If you list your system specs, we may be able to suggest an even better upgrade for you...
     
  6. dlb

    dlb MajorGeek

    Funny you should mention this.... I was thinkning about this late last night, and you're probably right.... maybe invest the $100 in a video upgrade or save it until you have enough an even better video card.....
     
  7. hegemon875

    hegemon875 Private First Class

    Well its to late because I already bought the extra RAM, but I would still love to know what you guys think would be the most worth while upgrades for me. I was thinking about getting the AMD 64 x2 6000+ with it being so cheap now.

    Processor: AMD 64 x2 4600 2.4 GHz
    Graphics Card: Geforce 8800 GT OC 512 MB
    RAM: 3.5 GB PC2-4200 (266 MHz)
    Power Supply: Antec Earthwatts LINK
    Motherboard: ASUSTek a8m2n-la LINK

    Ive attached DXdiag
     

    Attached Files:

    Last edited: Dec 4, 2007
  8. hegemon875

    hegemon875 Private First Class

    *Ignore this I just realized I could edit my previous post*
     
  9. Wyatt_Earp

    Wyatt_Earp MajorGeek

    Yeah, I would think, unless you wanted to drop $500 to upgrade your Geforce 8800GT to a GTX, and since you won't be able to do SLI with that motherboard, the processor would give you the most bang for the buck. That processor upgrade will probably yield anywhere from a 5%-15% increase in gaming performance. (depending on the game, resolution, etc.) Only you can decide if it's worth it.

    If it were me though, I'd just save the money for the next computer, or spend it on something else. Maybe a bigger monitor. :) If the computer plays games at a resolution/fps that you are comfortable with, then I wouldn't bother upgrading until the next generation of hardware.
     
  10. hegemon875

    hegemon875 Private First Class

    Hmmm what kind of performance boost would I see if I upgraded to a phenom 9500?
     
  11. Wyatt_Earp

    Wyatt_Earp MajorGeek

    I don't see any benchmarks after a quick google search, but since the 9500 is clocked at 2.2Ghz, which is 200Mhz slower than your processor, you probably won't increase gaming performance at all. In fact, it might even be slower.

    The reason for this is that games really only use 1 core efficiently. Increasing the number of cores doesn't scale very well whereas increasing the clock speed yields much better results. Of course for server applications and other programs like Photoshop, video editing software, etc. more cores will give good boosts in performance since these programs are written to take advantage of the extra cores.

    And actually, after looking through the charts again, it looks like going to the 6000+ might be more like a 15-20% boost. I must have looked at the wrong ones.

    In case you didn't know, there are some benchmarks at www.tomshardware.com that will give you a relationship between processor models and video card models, along with hard drives, routers and NAS devices. They are not far from the top on the right side of the page. Obviously there are a lot of variables when benchmarking, but they should give you a rough idea of how much of a performance increase you would get by upgrading.
     

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