Now that 8GB seems to be standard for power users...

[Rubycon]

When will we see "enthusiast" boards supporting >8GB RAM? Workstation boards like Tyan and Supermicro do but these don't really have the overclocking and tuning that enthusiasts long for.

[Terminator voice] It IS time! [/Terminator voice]

 

[jaqie]

Pardon me, but at least with AMD processors (since they have an onboard memory controller and the mobo just makes the connections and feeds the chips power) they all already support the max that the chip does, the rest is just marketing.

 

[Rubycon]

No.

What I'm trying to say is instead of maxing the board out with 8 one may need to go higher and right now that requires either a server or workstation board. Text

 

[jaqie]

No, it does not. Where on earth do you get your information?

 

[Rubycon]

Originally posted by: jaqie
No, it does not. Where on earth do you get your information?

Sorry but I have no idea what you are trying to say here.

1 - You cannot put more than 8GB ram in an enthusiast board
2 - If you need more than this memory you must use either a workstation board, or server board.

 

[jaqie]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16813128014
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16813138059
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16813131013
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16813128014
Same motherboard chipset, same processor acceptance, a smattering of supposed 16GB and 8GB max.
The problem here is the RAM chips, which those boards all have four slots. Thing is, there are 4GB dimms available either right now or extremely soon, by my research.
http://www.pclaunches.com/othe...tacking_technology.php This page was created a year ago, so likely the chips are out there, but hard to get ahold of. This is just a single example, I have seen a few sites selling them.
And then there's the possibility of using a "Simm-saver" style module, though that is a bit...jurry-riggish.

~edit~
One thing you may not know, an afterthought that I realized you may not know that you can use ECC ram in most non-server motherboards, this has been the case for many years, but most people just didn't/don't know it.

 

[Rubycon]

ECC may work in a lot of boards (the parity chip is ignored) but it's better if that is supported - and enabled. Every 975 and X38 board I've had indeed supports ECC ram.

Most servers require fully buffered ECC ram which is a good thing especially with higher density modules. Samsung has announced 8GB DIMMS, for example.

Those are AMD/NV boards and yes touting 16GB support on THOSE boards would certainly boil down to marketing.

Simm savers - wow that brings back memories. Have not seen them since EDO 486/P5 days. Lots of servers use a similar idea - a riser card with 8,12,16 or even more DIMM sockets on them plugging into a proprietary slot.

 

[jaqie]

actually, it is not seen in a lot of mobos, rather not noticed, but ECC support through a manual bios setting, and therefore fully supported.

~edit~
I noticed you talking about buffering (registered) and not just ECC. Yeah, the irony is a lot of people don't know that those are two seperate technologies.

For the record, I have an intel STL2 mobo here that requires PC133 REG/ECC ram in it, which I am using PC100 REG/ECC sticks in. Works well, despite the fact the mobo supposedly requires PC133 - it gives an error on bootup then runs them at PC100 speeds. Another marketing issue - it physically supports PC100 RAM speeds but marketing always said it doesn't.

 

[jaqie]

So now you see that you indeed can put 16GB on at least some standard system motherboards - as long as you shell out for the hard to find but available 4GB DIMMs, and soon it seems 32GB will be possible with the same four slots.

 

[Modelworks]

I have a 16GB and a 32GB stocked motherboard from tyan and the fbdimms they use are beyond expensive.

I really do hope we start seeing boards that can support higher memory without going with tyan. Tyan makes some fine boards, but its too costly.

I'm going to mention something here that I hope doesn't get a friend in trouble, I think that risk is really low or I wouldn't mention it

He works at samsung.
About 16 months ago they started working on a memory design that allowed up to 64GB to occupy a new memory design that worked similar to the way cpu sockets do. Its not flat like a cpu , but comes with the heatsink already integrated and is about the size of a northbridge with the heatsink. They said the project was just reasearch, but then about two months ago he told me they were discussing refitting one of the plants for a long term project and he kind of hinted that was it.


If samsung does go that way with memory design we could really start packing the memory on the motherboards.

 

[lopri]

No Intel desktop chipset that I know of support more than 8GB of RAM.

 

[Rubycon]

Originally posted by: jaqie
So now you see that you indeed can put 16GB on at least some standard system motherboards - as long as you shell out for the hard to find but available 4GB DIMMs, and soon it seems 32GB will be possible with the same four slots.

Problem is I would not want to use an AM2 board in any of my systems.

I will be purchasing 4GB ECC unbuffered DIMMS for the new RAID cards though.

 

[jaqie]

I never said it was only AMD systems. They were merely an example as I know AMD tech better then intel tech at the moment and thus thought it better to stick with things I knew for sure rather then saying something I wasn't sure about. I just about guarantee a lot of intel chipsets actually support 16GB or more, but only market as 8GB for various reasons, just like the examples I gave above.

 

[Rubycon]

I've tried doing this and it ignores the "other half" of the module effectively making a 4GB module a 2GB module though.

 

[jaqie]

You know what that smacks of to me? that the BIOS is forcibly disabling high density dimms beyond a certain size. Intel has done this before, IIRC.
~edit~
I wonder if a linux bootstrap on such a board flashed into the BIOS area (thus replacing the bios with linux bootstrap code) would be able to see all of the ram in such a system?
~/edit~

Modelworks: FBdimms are buffered aka registered dimms if I remember correctly, and heck yeah they are expensive. I remember buying them new for the mobo I had before this STL2, it was a Tyan Patriot BX100 dual slot 1 server mobo, which I got four ECC/registered PC100 dimms for (same ones I use now in the STL2). the dual P3/600s, the mobo, and the ram set me back almost as much as three normal computers, but it was so worth it, as I had true SMP and that little tank lasted so many years...finally died on me in early 2007... Soon after I got the STL2 and slapped in the RAM and a couple of matched P3 933s (non S-spec) I had gotten used.

Oh, and just for the record, everyone:
I know that over the net I tend to come off as being abrasive, snooty, and the like, but I am the exact opposite, I never mean to especially to other techs, but I have learned over time that my text does look like that... just letting you all know that I have the utmost respect for fellow techs and if I come off as that to any of you I definitely do not intend to.

 

[taltamir]

Originally posted by: jaqie
You know what that smacks of to me? that the BIOS is forcibly disabling high density dimms beyond a certain size. Intel has done this before, IIRC.

http://www.ubersoft.net/comic/...very-simple-difference

Originally posted by: jaqie
I know that over the net I tend to come off as being abrasive, snooty, and the like, but I am the exact opposite, I never mean to especially to other techs, but I have learned over time that my text does look like that... just letting you all know that I have the utmost respect for fellow techs and if I come off as that to any of you I definitely do not intend to.

You never seemed that way to me.
Don't ADMIT to being abrasive or rude... If someone calls you rude and you are not trying to be, its him who is misinterpreting you. Not you who is misrepresenting yourself.

 

[jaqie]

LOL! all too true. I actually have an old SB16PCI I adore, and got soooooo p*ssed off when it would not work with vista (32 bit or 64 bit) or xp64. REALLY angered me.

 

[jaqie]

Originally posted by: taltamir
You never seemed that way to me.
Don't ADMIT to being abrasive or rude... If someone calls you rude and you are not trying to be, its him who is misinterpreting you. Not you who is misrepresenting yourself.

That's the clencher, I never admitted to it, read how I worded things. I am always very careful about that!
Thanks.

 

[taltamir]

that strip is based half on real cases, and half on imagination... so I wondering if in this case there really is someone who hacked the drivers to make them work with older cards...