A8N-SLI Premium - Upgrade Ballistics from 1G to 2G?

[walkman]

Yoo Hoo -- I finally got 2 sticks of crucial memory to work in my motherboard. Before I could only get 1 stick of my Ballistics 512 PC3200 CL2 memory to boot. Based on a tip here I changed the DRAM voltage from 'auto' to '2.7', and put in the 2nd stick.

Has worked ever since!


Question: Should I worry about getting to 2 gig of memory? (I'm not going to overclock, I'm just looking for something stable that will run Photoshop, Video editing, lots of concurrent applications, & games.) Should I add 2 more 512 sticks? What brand?



AMD X2 4400
Nvidia EVGA 7800 GTX

 

[Capt Caveman]

Yes, I've found that the default dram voltage to be the problem for many folks with this motherboard. If you use photoshop, do video editing and play particular games like BF2, 2gb will be a very helpful upgrade. Your load times will reduce quite a bit. And with an AMD X2 4400, you'll be able to run more apps at once.

Usually, it's best to stick with the same sticks of ram. However, if you're not overclocking, you can usually get away with using any brand that is using the same timings and voltages as you have now. Using 4 sticks (4x512mb) compared to 2 sticks (2x1gb), forces you to use 2T memory timing but the hit in performance is very small.

 

[lopri]

walkman,

Everybody comes here at first and say "I'm not going to overclock," or "I'll probably try oc'ing a bit but that'll be it." then becomes the most ferocious overclockers within months. (I know it was the case for me)
This is not meant to be an offense of any kind, but just a friendly advice.
I'd say you should plan ahead. Even if you don't think about overclocking for now, it doesn't hurt to be prepared. Better overclocking parts are usually more stable parts, anyway.

Slightly off topic, but just a thought.
lop

 

[VooDooAddict]

Originally posted by: lopri
walkman,

Everybody comes here at first and say "I'm not going to overclock," or "I'll probably try oc'ing a bit but that'll be it." then becomes the most ferocious overclockers within months. (I know it was the case for me)
This is not meant to be an offense of any kind, but just a friendly advice.
I'd say you should plan ahead. Even if you don't think about overclocking for now, it doesn't hurt to be prepared. Better overclocking parts are usually more stable parts, anyway.

Slightly off topic, but just a thought.
lop

It can go both ways. People who spend a premium on better overclocking parts don't always have time to make the most use of them.

 

[walkman]

I see your point Lopri, and I've played around with overclocking in the past. But I've had too much experience with my system acting weird and not knowing what the problem is. I'm sure that 98% of the time it's a OS or software problem, but invaribly I start wondering if it's a problem with the overclocking.

So, for me, I've found it's better to avoid the question marks and just use the defaults.


Anyone know if 4 sticks of 512 PC3200 ballistic memory will work ok with the A8N-SLI Premium?

 

[walkman]

I want to update my original post in case someone is trying to solve a problem with their memory in the future.

I was never able to get my machine to boot again with the original memory. I called Crucial, and with no hassles, they agreed to exchange my memory for free.

I purchased an additional 1 gig (2x512) memory at the same time.

The new memory fired up the first time (and all subsequent boots).

Without optimizing my memory settings I get the following 3dmarks05 scores:

7725 - 512 memory

7796 - 2 gig memory


Very little difference in 3dmarks05, but the system feel significantly quicker with multiple apps running.