Honest RAM question - which is better?

[respawn]

All I have left is to buy the RAM, this is what I bought in the last week ready to build:

Seagate 1TB drive
Liteon DVD burner
Corsair 400R case
GPU - MSI GTX 660
power supply - 750w modular
mother board GA-Z77-DS3H
Samsung 840 Series 2.5 inch 120GB SSD
Intel Core i7-3770 Ivy Bridge 3.4GHz
Microsoft Windows 7 Professional SP1 64-bit - OEM

I am having some issues/confusion on the best choice of RAM.

For instance, I am trying to decide on which of these:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820233366
Thinking of getting 4 sticks of these for 32GB. They will be on shellshocker in 2 hours.
I am just assuming $50 each for $200 total. The specs being:
DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800)
Timing 10-10-10-27
Cas Latency 10
Voltage 1.5V

But is that too slow? For about $30 more ($230 for 2 order) of
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820148657
I can get these specs:
DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800)
Timing 8-8-8-24
Cas Latency 8
Voltage 1.35V

To me, it seems to be a lot more speed, no? And it isnt even on sale...

Any words of wisdom?

 

[Enigmoid]

All I have left is to buy the RAM, this is what I bought in the last week ready to build:

Seagate 1TB drive
Liteon DVD burner
Corsair 400R case
GPU - MSI GTX 660
power supply - 750w modular
mother board GA-Z77-DS3H
Samsung 840 Series 2.5 inch 120GB SSD
Intel Core i7-3770 Ivy Bridge 3.4GHz
Microsoft Windows 7 Professional SP1 64-bit - OEM

I am having some issues/confusion on the best choice of RAM.

For instance, I am trying to decide on which of these:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820233366
Thinking of getting 4 sticks of these for 32GB. They will be on shellshocker in 2 hours.
I am just assuming $50 each for $200 total. The specs being:
DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800)
Timing 10-10-10-27
Cas Latency 10
Voltage 1.5V

But is that too slow? For about $30 more ($230 for 2 order) of
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820148657
I can get these specs:
DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800)
Timing 8-8-8-24
Cas Latency 8
Voltage 1.35V

To me, it seems to be a lot more speed, no? And it isnt even on sale...

Any words of wisdom?

RAM makes almost no difference in most things. The small change in timings is not worth it unless you want the lower power consumption.

 

[MontyAC]

If you don't care much about price, go for the second set. Better timings and lower voltage.

 

[UaVaj]

cas 10 to cas 8.

in everyday usage you will NOT see the difference. if measured/benchmarked - you will see about 1-3% better performance. nothing worth bragging about.

you are better off putting that $30 toward the next faster cpu or gpu.

lastly if you have the $$$ to spare - might as well go all out and get cas 8, low profile, low voltage. afterall this is an enthauaist forum.

 

[respawn]

Seems to be split between just spend the extra money and get the "faster/better" RAM and others saying no point to it... decisions, decisions... I think if the sale is less than $40 a stick I will just get the cheaper RAM...

 

[Blain]

If I were shopping for high quality memory, I would use the following parameters as a guide...

* DDR3 rated at 1.5v or lower
* DDR3 rated at the lowest CAS I could afford
* DDR3 rated at the highest clock speed I could afford
* Limit the scope of my purchease to G.Skill, Mushkin, Samsung, Corsair XMS or Crucial (non-Ballistix)

While not wavering on the voltage point, I would balance the other issues with my budget.

Remember, my goal is not pure "benchmarking" performance, but simply finding the highest quality memory I can afford. ^_^

The only reason I pay a premium for low latency, high speed, low voltage memory is...
Quality and quality alone.

1.5v is the JEDEC DDR3 voltage standard.
Stay with 1.5v or less if you can afford it..

What he said

 

[bryanl]

To me, it seems to be a lot more speed, no?

It's rated for up to 25% more speed, but you won't get anywhere close to such an increase in performance unless you turn off the L2 and L2 caches - caching matters that much.

The Crucial Ballistix is rated 8-8-8-24, but their parent company Micron doesn't list any 1600 MHz chips faster than clk9. Still I'd prefer the Ballistix over the Corsair since it was likely tested more stringently.

 

[Anonemous]

Get either one, you won't notice the difference. Unless you plan on ocing, then get the ballistix.