How important is dual-channel RAM, on both Haswell and Skylake Celerons?

[VirtualLarry]

For normal desktop usage, not 3D gaming. Also, media playback.

I know that Skylake i3-6100 won't play back 4K video very well without dual-channel.

I'm just trying to pin down, whether my slight sluggishness on this mini-ITX PC I just built, with a G1820 and a single 8GB DDR3-1600 (@1333) DIMM, is because I had been using a G4400 (although, that one also only had a single 4GB DDR4-2133 DIMM), which is 3.3Ghz (SKL) versus 2.7Ghz (HSW), or if it's down to lacking dual-channel RAM.

I guess the Mhz and IPC difference (and L3 cache size difference) might make the biggest differences.

 

[monkeydelmagico]

helps iGPU a fair amount so the media playback takes a hit on single channel. Honestly I think the biggest difference is the pentium G4400 is newer, faster, and one product stack better than the celeron G1820

Why don't you put a dual channel kit in it and let us know? Termie did some testing like that for us: https://forums.anandtech.com/threads/dual-channel-vs-single-channel-ram-difference.2429243/

 

[VirtualLarry]

Part of the reason that I'm asking is, it's cheaper to buy a kit of 2x8GB DDR3-1600 / DDR4-2400, and then split it up and put 8GB in each machine that I'm building. I could put in the whole 16GB kit, and I do, sometimes, but not everybody needs 16GB for just desktop tasks yet. (Cheaper than buying two 2x4GB kits, that is. Plus, it provides an upgrade path.)

 

[mikeymikec]

I think it'll be some time before 4K video playback is considered a part of "normal desktop usage"

 

[TheELF]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RU94J768G5U
Ok I don't have a 4k display but 4k playback seemed ok on the 1820 with only one stick of ram, had it with one stick for quite some time,now I have dual channel for a while,never seen any noticeable difference in anything.

 

[renz20003]

Just throw a shorty gtx 1070 in it, should solve your problems.