Dual Channel Kits: For suckers?

[PingSpike]

They say that they're "tested together" but shouldn't any two identical sticks work properly in dual channel...and if not wouldn't they be deemed defective?

 

[Gurck]

Not suckers exactly, but I wouldn't buy one... Similarly, I wouldn't rice out my case or get 512mb of low latency pc5000 ram with heatspreaders over a gb of value ram.

 

[uOpt]

I have no problem with my individually bought Kingston sticks in dual-channel mode.

I don't overclock, though.

Personally I guess it is more of a money-milking strategy but it might differ by vendor.

 

[formulav8]

I have never - REPEAT "NEVER" had any problems with mixmatched memory in dual chanel configurations. Others said they have. But of the hundereds of computers or so that I have built, with a many being nForce2 dual channel mobo's and running about everyone in dual channel mode. I have never had a single problem related to the memory not working together in dual channel and most of them being mixmatched brands, chips and even sizes. Thats just my 2 pennys 🙂


Jason

 

[zephyrprime]

The only benefit is overclocking in my opinion. Don't you get a pair of sticks that OC to about the same amount with dual channel? Without that feature, you'd be stuck with the slower of your 2 sticks while OC'ing. It also wouldn't suprise me if the dual channel kits were also slightly better bins. For non-oc's, DC kits are a waste of money. Even for OC'ers, I'm not sure if it's a worthwhile investment.

 

[batmanuel]

I actually got THREE different brands of memory (Corsair, Kingston and some off brand generic) working prime 95 stable in an unbalanced dual channel set up (two 256 MB sticks in one channel, a single 512MB i another). The nForce 2 memory controller is rather forgiving.

 

[Gurck]

Originally posted by: zephyrprime
The only benefit is overclocking in my opinion. Don't you get a pair of sticks that OC to about the same amount with dual channel? Without that feature, you'd be stuck with the slower of your 2 sticks while OC'ing. It also wouldn't suprise me if the dual channel kits were also slightly better bins. For non-oc's, DC kits are a waste of money. Even for OC'ers, I'm not sure if it's a worthwhile investment.

Good point, I'd have to agree. My answer stands though, as I don't OC... but might if/when I get a CPU that will do it.. damn p4bs, my 2.67 won't even do 2.8 stably and stay under 60c load :frown:

 

[VirtualLarry]

Compatibility of RAM has gotten a lot better since mobos sporting dual-channel DDR memory controllers first appeared on the scene. Back then, perhaps "matched" DC pair kits had a point, but not so much any more. It's always been known that dissimilar memory DIMMs/chip-types could cause compatibility/instability issues, so try to avoid, but mixing memory isn't always necessarily going to cause a problem either. Basically, they are for people that want to save time and want guaranteed compatibility with each other, rather than have to spend time testing and doing the system-integration work themselves. (Like we all do.) It does help if the loading on the memory bus traces are roughly equal though, helps prevent aberrant voltage swings and "ringing" of signals, in case of a less-well-regulated DRAM power-plane.

 

[gwai lo]

what's odd is that I always thought buying in bulk was cheaper than buying parts separately...hmmm 😵