A8N-SLI Premium & Memory Configuration

[DannyLove]

I used to own a P4P800-Deluxe. I had 4 sticks of 512 RAM, they were both bought separately so it was used as 2x 512 kits at first when I upped it to 4.

With my new system, I purchased a kit of 2x 1GB, and they are on slots 1, and 3

Is it feasible to add sticks 2x 512 onto the 2,4 slots? Are there any draw-backs to this?

I did test this out and it did read as 3 GB, but left the Auto settings in BIOS. I didn't want to change the frequecies to 2-3-3-6 even though I'm sure I can...

The 512's in question are the:
Corsair TWINX1024-3200c2

Thanks!

danny~!

 

[MagnusTheBrewer]

You can add the ram. Your system will default to the speed of the slowest ram but, the auto system may drop the speed even more depending on how it is detected. Some MB's have a problem with different speed ram when fully populated but, yours seems to handle it fine. Check your bios settings and see if it also set you at 2T command rate.

 

[DannyLove]

Originally posted by: MagnusTheBrewer
You can add the ram. Your system will default to the speed of the slowest ram but, the auto system may drop the speed even more depending on how it is detected. Some MB's have a problem with different speed ram when fully populated but, yours seems to handle it fine. Check your bios settings and see if it also set you at 2T command rate.

great!
Both kits do require 2-3-3-6, and they are both DDR400... only difference is the 2GB kit has a requirement of 2.75v so technically, I can manually adjust those settings and all would be well?

also, 2T = 2 kit dual modules?, and 1T = 1 kit dual modules?

danny~!

 

[MagnusTheBrewer]

As long as the TWINX1024-3200c2 will work at 2.75v which they will, you can set timings to 2-3-3-6. The command rate is the delay between when a memory chip is selected and when the first active command can be issued. The factors that determine whether a memory subsystem can tolerate a 1T command rate are many, including the number of memory banks, the number of DIMMs present, and the quality of the DIMMs.

Basically a lower command rate is better. Your bios probably set the command rate to 2t when fully populated with ram but you may be able to run at 1T which could give you a significant boost at least in gaming.

 

[DannyLove]

it turns out I can have it under 2.75v but not with 1T at the same time. Mobo just beeps.

Also, after some benchmarks, I'm having trouble understanding the use of having more than 2 GB of RAM on this machine besides having more memory storage...

Here are some benchmarks:

2x1GB @ 2-3-3-6 1T

2x1GB & 2x512 @ 2-3-3-6 2T

it looks like the difference with 1T and 2T is huge, look at the Read/Write/Copy