RAM speed0_________0

My dad is offering to give me 512mb 2x256mb of pc2100 RAM, would this be beenficial to my computer that has 512mb of pc 3200 RAM? I have 4 Slots, 2 empty, would using my dad memory slow down my computer at all, or would it make a big difference.

 

Your PC3200 RAM would run at the slower speed of the PC2100 RAM if you used it.

 

well, would my perfromance be better with 1gb of slow ram or 512mb of fast ram?

 

Good question, I don't know.

 

Depends on how you use your machine.

The fastest ram in the world can't hep your performance if you've no spare ram left for applications.

Kind of like, it doesn't matter how fast your car is, if its out of gas.

 

I use my comput3r for gaming mostly, particularly FPS, mmorpgs, action, racing, strategs, and sometiems platformers.

 

most games are ok with 512MB ram ( that is if you kill all unneeded background apps ).....Loading times do tend to be faster with more ram... so all in all id say performance whould be about the same ether way ( trading faster load times for slower in game play more less ).... what video card are you running ??

 

6600gt, it is in my sig. and I have heard RAM can make a big difference 3dmark 06 says it requires 1gb

 

I donno its up to you.... Iv seen PC2100 ram run PC3200 speeds fine so maybe youl get lucky ...the PC2100 should run PC2700 speeds at least...

 

I don't know anythign about RAM OCing, the ram my dad is offering is stuff that came iwth his hp, it is proabbly pretty crappy, I kinda decided not to overclock anymore, my 6600gt was doing fine at 570/1100, then I ran 3dmark06 it got up to 79C when i play quake 4 it doesn't usually go above 72C and it idles at 52

 

Well in your case id prolly go for the 1 GB..... got stuff to do ill be on later tonight....

 

upgrade to 1gb, or add 1gb? and is it better to sue 2 sticks of 512mb or 1 stick of 1gb(same goes for any size)

 

general rule of thumb...... the fewer sticks of ram you have in the faster ( the same applys to the amount of ram you have ex 512Mb will be faster then 1Gb at the same speed and timings)...... its just EZer on the memory controler ... ex. 2x512MB whould be faster ( and whould overclock better ) then 4x256MB