Faster RAM for overclocking. Yes or No?

[Pez D Spencer]

Im not new to system building but I am new to overclocking. Im building a system with an Opteron 170 in it and was wondering about faster ram and overclocking.

I asked about this in a post the other day and someone said that I would need faster ram than the PC3200 that the mobo calls for, while another person said that I should just go for the PC3200 and use dividers.

I finally got a grasp on dividers and how they are used in overclocking but Im still not 100 percent sure if I should get faster ram than PC3200. Im getting an Asus A8N-32 SLI board. I was going to go for one of the DFI Lanparty boards but I decided on the A8N-32 because it has the 16x PCI-E. Even though from what ive read the 16x PCI-E didnt make that much of a difference. I was somewhat leery of the A8N-32 at first because I thought it might not be as good an overclocker as the DFI boards, but the reviews I read said that the A8N-32 was a very decent overclocker so Im going for it even thought it might not be quite as good an overclocker than the DFI boards.

So should I get faster RAM or just use dividers? If I should get faster RAM then how much faster should I get? PC3500? PC4000? I plan on slamming 2GB in it right now and maybe 2GB more in a month or two just for kicks.

If it matters at all, this will be a gaming rig and will have dual eVGA 7800GT cards in it.

Thanks.

 

[KoolDrew]

Unless you really plan on doing some serious overclocking don't even bother with expensive RAM, it isn't worth it. I would just get the cheapest from a reputable manufacturer. Corsair VS is a good choice.

Also, I wouldn't bother with SLI either and maybe look at the Epox NF4 Ultra board.

 

[theMan]

if you have to sacrifice any other part of your computer in order to get the overclocking ram, dont do it. if you can buy it without scaling down something else, go ahead. it will give you a few more FPS. but, if you have to reduce your video card or something, that will take away like 20 FPS. by the looks of it, you have plenty of money, but, i dont know.

 

[Pez D Spencer]

Well I dont have plenty of money but I have been saving for a little while and decided its time to go all out. I was going to go for GTX cards over GT's but a grand on video cards is just a little too steep for me. These eVGA GT's im getting have a 470 core clock and 1100 memory clock and thats good enough I think. 200 more apiece isn't worth the 20 or so MHz more core and 100 or 200 more MHz memory speeds I would get with the GTX"s. And Im no expert but I dont think 20 pixel pipelines versus 24 is going to matter THAT much either. Ill just save my dough and upgrade again when these GT's get old anyway.

So I reccon I'll just get some PC3200. I'm thinking about getting OCZ. It got good ratings on newegg and has some decent timings.

 

[CheesePoofs]

In my opinion, its better to get value ram and use a divider. You take a small performance hit (probalby not noticable) and save a decent amount of money.

 

[KoolDrew]

Well I dont have plenty of money but I have been saving for a little while and decided its time to go all out. I was going to go for GTX cards over GT's but a grand on video cards is just a little too steep for me. These eVGA GT's im getting have a 470 core clock and 1100 memory clock and thats good enough I think. 200 more apiece isn't worth the 20 or so MHz more core and 100 or 200 more MHz memory speeds I would get with the GTX"s. And Im no expert but I dont think 20 pixel pipelines versus 24 is going to matter THAT much either. Ill just save my dough and upgrade again when these GT's get old anyway.

I personally wouldn't bother with SLI at all. Just buy a single 7800GT and upgrade it when needed.

 

[lyssword]

anyone know if normal (vanialla nf4) dfi nf4 dagf has memory dividers?
bah nvm I will go on their website and read the manual

 

[coomar]

don't need the expensive ram

i thought you couldn't overclock on vanilla nf4, no option to change the HTT (fsb on other platforms)

 

[Pyrokinetic]

Well, I have used both low latency ram and high bandwidth, and I stayed with DDR400 ram with fast timings using dividers. Because AMD uses an onboard memory controller, the memory timings make more of a performance gain than say using DDR600 at 2.5-4-4-8 (at least in my experience). So I have two 512MB sticks of Corsair XMS running at 2-2-2-7 using DDR400 on my overclocked system. (11x255 = 2805 ; using 333 mem divider is 2805/14=200 or DDR400). I have also used G.SKILL DDR600 without the divider at the aforementioned 2.5-4-4-8 timings (DDR510) and found it somewhat slower than using the XMS sticks with the divider.

Now I am using a single core chip that benefits little from having more bandwidth than DDR400. So if you plan on using dual-core you might find some benefit to having more bandwidth. I still think you should go for the lowest possible timings though.

OCZ makes a PC3500 (DDR433) set (2x512MB) that is 2-2-2-5 that may be worth looking into.

 

[lyssword]

Originally posted by: coomar
don't need the expensive ram

i thought you couldn't overclock on vanilla nf4, no option to change the HTT (fsb on other platforms)

My opty is due in 2 days, I'll b sure to tell u guys if it does/doesnt oc

 

[Cynicist]

buying an sli setup is a complete waste of money. Example, my friend downed $800 to get two sli 6800gt's (when they were new), and now hes having to sell both of them for around $300-400. Unless you are rich don't bother, a single 7800gt will still handle any game out today on max settings. Instead, spend it on another component of your pc.

 

[fire400]

You'll get clickier performance with more expensive RAM if you couple it with a good CPU and motherboard, even if you are not overclocking. Combine all of this with a WD Raptor and a nice PSU, and you've got a sleek system, even if your graphics card isn't very high end.

If you have money to throw away, get the more expensive stuff anyway. Otherwise, value RAM isn't a bad option to choose.

Personally, don't get the expensive stuff until you've had experience with the cheaper stuff, this way, you know which routes to take according to performance capabilties that fits your computing needs on a system.

 

[Elfear]

Go with the less expensive ram. You won't notice the difference between it and the nice overclocking ram. I've been through about 5 sets of good ram and finally settled on just more capacity rather than the ultra-low latency stuff or the extremely high bandwidth ram. Very happy about my decision.

Originally posted by: Cynicist
buying an sli setup is a complete waste of money. Example, my friend downed $800 to get two sli 6800gt's (when they were new), and now hes having to sell both of them for around $300-400. Unless you are rich don't bother, a single 7800gt will still handle any game out today on max settings. Instead, spend it on another component of your pc.

Hmmmm. If you're talking about max settings at 1024x768 than you're absolutely right. SLI wouldn't be worth the money. But, I can tell you for a fact that at resolutions of 1600x1200 and higher (sometimes even 1280x1024) a single 7800GT will get pummeled by some of the newer games out today at max settings. FEAR, COD2, etc. Read some reviews before you go spouting off about things you don't know.

 

[Zebo]

Ram is a pretty big scam out there...75-200% price premium for marginal performance gains...on a budget - you should always buy cheapest and certainly not the premium stuff.

Best deal is 2 x 512 ballistix PC3200 for $120 it's still 100% more than value ram for marginal performance gains but at least it gives you satifaction and flexibility of 2-2-2 low latency if you want to play with that or high bandwidth if you want to play that way too. That's as "high end" as I'd recommend and only because it allows you to tinker multiple ways so you can discover on your own the lack of benefits that highend modules provide..

I can afford anything I want computer wise and if I were building a new comp right now I'd get two of these for $66 total.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820141164

And they overclock well too like a lot of value sticks will - read the reveiws.