680i Linked vs. Unlinked RAM

[Pez D Spencer]

Right now I've got an EVGA 680i A1 mobo and I'm still running my old P4 3.0GHz 530 and 2GB (4 x 512MB) of Value Select and Hynix RAM (4-4-4-12). I'm currently running the P4 @ 3.6GHz and unlinked so the RAM is still at 533MHz. I ran it linked and the OC on my CPU pushed the RAM to over 600MHz. However, the system crashed after a few hours of running it this way so I went back to unlinked and haven't had any more crashes, so I assume the probelm was cheap RAM at too high of a clock.

But back to my point. This A1 mobo calls for 800MHz and up to 1200MHz DDR2. Originally I had planned on putting 2GB of DDR2 800 in it now and mabye 2GB more in a few months. But then I started thinking. I plan on putting a Q6600 in this board and if I understand correctly, running this DDR2 533 with the Q6600 in this board would cause the processor to run underclocked correct? But what if I ran the CPU and RAM unlinked? Then the CPU should run at it's rated speed (or faster if I OC) and the RAM can still run at it's regular 533MHz like it is now right?

I read somewhere that there really wasn't a huge gain by running the RAM and CPU linked when overclocking. 533 and 800 isn't that big of a difference so do you guys think I can save a few bucks now by running the Q6600 and my DDR2 533 in unlinked mode and just get some 800MHz or faster RAM later?

Let me know what you think.

 

[myocardia]

Q6600's have a 266 Mhz FSB, unless overclocked, so your RAM would work fine. And since you have a 680i-based board, you'd be fine even if you decided to overclock. Now, don't get me wrong, you'd get more performance if you had faster RAM, but not that much more.

 

[Pez D Spencer]

Thanks for the info.

 

[Sylvanas]

If you ran your Q6600 @ 266fsb make sure it is at a 1:1 ratio which effectively makes your ram run at double the FSB (533mhz). As myocardia said, you'd be fine if you decided to OC anyway on a 680i as they can run their FSB speed independently from the RAM, so you could increase your Processors FSB yet maintain that 533mhz on the RAM.