Is more RAM necessarily better? Does Brand matter?

Gang
I need some knowledge transfer here.
my HP DC7600 has a nominal max RAM capacity of 4GB. But with the highest-speed supported, only two DIMM's [2x1GB] can be supported - at the slower PC2-4200 533mhz , it can go to full 4GB - 4x1GB ea.

nominal specs [voltage, packaging, CL, speed, pin config] being equal, does the brand matter? why kingston? why corsair? why not 'house brand' if the feedback on it is positive [good compatibility, low DOA] ??

Then, more interestingly: is it better to go with 2GB at 667mhz or 4gb at the slower spec?
thx!

 

I've never bought the high end stuff like OCZ and am quite happy with value type Kingstons. As to how much, it all depends what you do with the system. Regular folk don't need more than 2GB and if this is the same rig as you're talking about with the 240W power supply, I'd keep my money in my pocket. Now if you said you had 256MB running XP then I'd I'd say get up to a gig.

 

thx augie. as I rummage about looking for a 'tie-breaker' answer, I'm not finding one. I run XP Pro, sp3. I was under the impression that the windows memory management routine would take advantage of any 'excess' RAM as disk-buffer, and do as good a job as the aftermarket tools available. am I wrong about that? my drive is pretty decent, a seagate barracuda 7200rpm mod ST380819AS... not the latest/greatest, but not a dog. I had a Gforce pcix16 7300gs lying around so I put it in.

due to the plethora of choices on ram right now, it effectively will cost no more to do 4GB of the pc2-4200 than to do 2gb of the faster. its a nit really.
I'm saving the larger dollars to upgrade my monitor to something with 1080p capability

 

One thing to remember about RAM is that a 32bit OS can only address 3gb of memory (actually it's a bit over 3gb) due to unavoidable restrictions and limitations imposed by the 32bit architecture. To effectively address and use 4gb of RAM and more, you need a 64bit operating system. Many are the times I have had to deal with people who installed 8gb of RAM in their XP machines and they start freaking out 'cuz Windows reports only 3.2gb of RAM installed.... so, go with the 2gb of memory for now. When you upgrade to a 64bit OS, you can then upgrade your memory too....

:-D

(BTW- 32bit architecture is commonly abbreviated as x86 and 64bit commonly uses x64 )

 

Generally, more megabytes always win over higher megahertz, if you use the full amount of installed memory. I doubt you will... I use my XP computer as my back-up gaming system, and it does just fine on 2GB. Unless you take up video-editing as a hobby, you probably won't need any more. In fairness, I should admit that never stopped me. I didn't need the second gigabyte of memory when I bought it and installed it those years ago, after all... LOL

 

If you go for Video Editing, x64 will support sufficient RAM, though not now.