Gigabyte GA-P31-DS3L motherboard

[ssilverm]

I'm about to build a system based on an Intel E6750 processor and a
GA-P31-DS3L motherboard. I currently have two 1Gb sticks of Corsair
TWIN2X2048-6400 RAM to go in it. I'm also considering installing the 64-bit
version of Vista Home Premium, in which case I will purchase a further two
sticks of the aforementioned memory. However, I'm puzzled by a couple of
statements in the motherboard's specs.

The first is :

"Because of chipset limitations, do not populate both DIMM sockets of the
same channel (e.g. DDRII1 and DDRII2), or populate 4 DIMM sockets with
double-sided memory modules to prevent system's failure to start or
incorrect detection of memory modules."

The second is:

"Because of chipset limitations, when using FSB 1333 MHz CPU with populating
all DIMM sockets, memory frequency will be reduced from the original, and
system instability or incorrect detection of memory module may be occur."

I'm probably being thick here, but I can't quite work out the ramifications
of this. Does it mean that although Gigabyte have provided four memory slots
they can't all be used simultaneously? Also, if I do populate all of them
with the memory mentioned above, what can I expect to happen in practice?

Any and all ideas gratefully received.

 

[o1die]

If using 4 sticks, single sided sticks means that the chips populate only one side of the memory stick. I use 4 sticks in my system, but set the timings and speed manually without overclocking. If you're going to try overclocking, your board may select the memory speed using built in ratios. If you're worried about stability, then use only 2 sticks. Two 2 gig sticks may cost you as little as $100 or less after rebate. Fry's had adata 2 gig sticks for only $75 in pairs a few days ago.