how much RAM should I use?

[slaves123]

thinking about updating some parts of my computer RAM enter the scene, i'm thinking in buying a mother socket A with dual channel, i know in the Athlon processor the dual channel does not make THE difference, but after all it helps... my questions is... as i need to have 2 sticks of ram to use dual channel should i buy 2 x 256? or should i but 1 of 512 and wait till i've got some more money and buy another of 512? it is worth to have 1GB for a normal use computer? with some games OK but after all now with my SDRAM 512mb i'm very good, should i go for 1 giga? thank you all, you answer will be very usefull for me

 

[FrustratedUser]

1x512 and upgrade later.

 

[Duvie]

Some games like 1942 and such really enjoy it...otherwise video editing really like its as well as lots of multitasking...

I say get what you can afford....Maybe the money you save in 512mb of ram you could upgrade vid card which can give you more bang for the buck....I have 1gb and I use it quite a bit and rarely pagefile but then again I run lots of multimedia/rendering apps...

 

[VIAN]

You need the gig, just running steam and a game on it leaves me with about 50megs of my 512. 1x512

 

[slaves123]

all of you recomend me the giga up to now, is there any other comment?

 

[THUGSROOK]

1gig

 

[zShowtimez]

Aye, 1 gig

 

[FPSguy]

At least on the Intel chipsets, 4 DIMMs in dual channel mode perform better than 2 DIMMS, especially if you buy matched double sided DIMMs. Link to conclusion from AnandTech article on the topic. Assuming that is true for Socket A motherboards as well, and assuming you can find a good one with 4 DIMM slots, why not get the best of both worlds by buying 2 256MB DIMMs now and 2 more 256MB DIMMs later?

 

[slaves123]

on the socket a motherboards, at least the ones i'm considering there are only 3 dimms, AND only support 2 dimms of DDR 400, so the 4 dimms won't be usefull because i'm not going to be able to use use more than 2, i'm considering various mothers, but all of them with nForce 2 SPP Chipset

 

[Super6]

1 Gig, 512 now and 512MB later.

Super6

 

[slaves123]

ok i'm almost decided 512 now and 512 later, but later... what is later?
for my perhaps it mean a coupple of months, why? well i'm on ly 14 so it is no sooo easy to get 50 bucks out of nowhere so for some months i'm goind to run a single channel mode, so i'm going to sacrifice some performance, is that too bad? or the dual channel really don't make big difference?

 

[screw3d]

Originally posted by: slaves123
ok i'm almost decided 512 now and 512 later, but later... what is later?
for my perhaps it mean a coupple of months, why? well i'm on ly 14 so it is no sooo easy to get 50 bucks out of nowhere so for some months i'm goind to run a single channel mode, so i'm going to sacrifice some performance, is that too bad? or the dual channel really don't make big difference?

It is not a very big difference. You should do fine with 1 x 512MB.