Pulling my hair out.. RDRAM or DDR333

[SteelCityFan]

I am expecting just enough tax money back to get a Mobo, P4 1.6A/1.8A, Power Supply, and 512MB RAM to replace my archaic P3 600 on a P3V4X. I have been looking at benchmarks for about a month. Some show RDRAM with a slight edge.. some show DDR333 with the edge (the cheap MSI 645 Ultra seems to be the speed leader of DDR... or at least from the reviews I have seen).

Now, the expensive RDRAM is the same price as DDR333, so either is a viable and affordable option.

I have gone back 20 pages or so on this forum, and there really are not too many posts giving opinions on which is better... let alone stating reasons why they feel that way.



What would you recommend, and what Motherboard would you choose to go with it?

Since my Power Supply right now is a 250 Watt, and only Asus allows me to use that on a P4 board (EZ-Plug), what brands should I be looking at?


Thanks for the help... I am not one to upgrade every 6 months to a year, so I need to be happy with my choice...

 

[Chadder007]

RDRAM does give you the best overall performance if your not going to Overclock your processor. If you want to overclock....you can possibly overclock the 1.6a to 2.4 ghz with DDR333, which would probably give you the best overclocked performance.

 

[burek]

I think i850 and RAMBUS is the way to go. Stability and performance... you cant beat that

 

[JellyBaby]

My vote is for DDR. Performance is about the same, it overclocks better and you're not supporting the litigous Rambus, Inc.

If you're going with DDR333 and assuming it complies with the final Jedec spec., you should be able to use it in your next upgrade, too. Whereas with that Rambus you'd probably want to buy 1066 for the next upgrade.

 

[SocrPlyr]

overclocking go w/ the ddr
not go w/ the rdram, b/c intel's chipsets are going to be the most stable etc...

my opinion

Josh

 

[MadRat]

DDR doesn't benefit the Pentium 4, even when you crank 160+fsb. The P4 was designed for the latency of RDRAM and is best suited to work on the 850 chipset. I'm guessing that there is no need to wait for the mythical 32-bit RDRAM; it will not be a huge boost to the P4 because it has too much bandwidth. Plain PC1066 RDRAM will be great to use with the new 533fsb.

 

[mrman3k]

Defintely if you are going the P4 route, only get RDRAM, much higher bandwidth and other tech. features that DDR does not offer.

 

[burek]

Madrat:


<< I'm guessing that there is no need to wait for the mythical 32-bit RDRAM >>



When is this 32-bit RDRAM supposed to come out? Do you have a Rambus roadmap or specs??

 

[MadRat]

RAMBUS Roadmap

RDRAM Devices
Joining 800MHz RDRAM devices on the long-term PC memory roadmap are two additional frequencies, 1066MHz and 1200MHz. Initially supported by Samsung, Toshiba and Elpida, these new timing bins will increase RDRAM performance by up to 50% over today's PC800 RDRAM. The new PC1066 and PC1200 RDRAM devices will become available in volume production in 2002 and 2005, respectively.

RIMM Modules
In addition to RDRAM device frequency increases, the RIMM module width will be increased from its present 16 bits to 32 and 64 bits. This extension effectively doubles and quadruples the RIMM module bandwidth. Combined with RDRAM frequency increases, Rambus has developed a PC memory roadmap that is easily scalable to 9.6 GB/s.

 

[JackBurton]

RDRAM gives MUCH better performance than DDR ram, especially when overclocked. Check this out:

Sandra 2001 scores using two platforms (DDR vs RDRAM):

P4 1.6A@2.128GHz (133MHz FSB)
Asus P4B266-C
PC2100 DDR memory

CPU benchmark:
ALU 4161 MIPS
FPU/iSSE2 1114/2611 MFLOPS

CPU Multi-Media benchmark:
Integer iSSE2 8467 it/s
Floating-Point iSSE2 10333 it/s

P4 1.9(Willamette)@2.128GHz (112MHz FSB)
Asus P4T-E
PC800 RDRAM

CPU benchmark:
ALU 4135 MIPS
FPU/iSSE2 1107/2614 MFLOPS

CPU Multi-Media benchmark:
Integer iSSE2 8403 it/s
Floating-Point iSSE2 10385 it/s

Check out how close these systems perform, and the DDR based system has a Northwood AND a 133MHz FSB on the RDRAM based board. You'll see MUCH better gains when overclocking RDRAM than when overclocking DDR. DDR based systems are nice, but I'll take a RDRAM based system over it any day. I mean come on, RDRAM is priced VERY close to DDR memory now. Why not just go with RDRAM? I recommend however taht you go with an Abit TH7II instead of a P4T-E. I have a feeling that my P4T-E won't let me overclock my future Northwood as much as teh TH7II. That's why I'm going to switch as soon as I get one.


P.S. The results above where from a person posting his results (1.6A@2.128) and my results (1.9@2.128).

 

[dullard]

Madrat beat me, so here is a graphical roadmap.

See pages 10-12. Samsung starts manufacturing PC1066 in 1Q 2002. 32bit PC1066 maufactured in 2Q 2002. Samsung starts testing its PC1200 manufacturing in 4Q 2002.

Page 22 also shows a decent roadmap.

 

[ToBeMe]

<< overclocking go w/ the ddr
not go w/ the rdram, b/c intel's chipsets are going to be the most stable etc...

my opinion

Josh >>


Nope..............the highest O/C's to date with the Northwwods have been with RD & the TH7II! BUT, DDR also does a good job of O/C'ing, my choices would first be the TH7II with RD, then, the SiS645 in the Asus Flavor P4S333 with DDR.

Good Luck whichever direction you go!

 

[burek]

Anyone have info on the Tulloch chipset, will it be "official" support for PC1066 and PC1200 or will it offer substantial performace increases over the i850. Is it good to wait for Tulloch or will the i850 paired with PC1066 and 533FSB offer similar performance?

 

[FishTankX]

My advice is to stick to rambus. DDR is hitting a speed ceiling very soon that will require new motherboards and crap and stuff, and RAMBUS seems to keep on chugging. DDR is a doomed technology. DDRII is another story, but DDR just doesn't have enough frequency headroom. RDRAM will be your best friend if your overclocking because bandwidth is *imperative* to the Williamette's performance and in part the Northwood's (Decreased reliance on memory bus with the new cache has lessened the demand for RDRAM over DDR for higher clockspeeds, as in 2.6GHZ+). My advice is 1.6A +TH7II Raid. And overclock that MOFO! weehee.. just find some decent rambus and you might hit the mythical 533/1066 barrier. And that equates to 8-9% performance pickup. Note:A northwood using 400/PC800 will, at the same clockspeed, be beaten by a Williamette using 533/PC1066. And 32Bit RDRAM *does* have a purpose. wanna know? It will let you go back to the days where you only had to plug in 1 memory module at a time to get a working system. No more pairs. Also it will decrease latency because of RAMBUS's serial architecture. Long live RDRAM! Down with RAMBUS! I hope they sue em to death and it becomes an open standard. BTW, Samsung PC800 has become a tad less expensive than good Kingmax PC2700.

 

[Athlon4all]

<< RDRAM does give you the best overall performance if your not going to Overclock your processor. If you want to overclock....you can possibly overclock the 1.6a to 2.4 ghz with DDR333, which would probably give you the best overclocked performance. >>

Quite the contrary. Abit TH7II wiht 533fsb+PC1066 (easily doable with a 1.6A and new Samsung or Corsair PC800) will be much faster than a SiS 645 (or 845-D for that matter)+ 533fsb. Plus, RDRAM is barely any more expensive than DDR so why not?

<< And 32Bit RDRAM *does* have a purpose. wanna know? It will let you go back to the days where you only had to plug in 1 memory module at a time to get a working system. No more pairs. >>

Unfortunately, the platform for 32-bit RIMM's that would not require Dual Channels (Intel's Tulloch) has been canceled:disgust: and you can't just run 850 in Single Channel mode AFAIK. Why did Intel ever cancel Tulloch? Who knows. 850e will take it's place providing PC1066+533fsb support. So I'd go for TH7II+Samsung or Corsair PC800

 

[SteelCityFan]

Great.. thanks for all the replies. I have been going back and forth in my mind for a long time now as I watch the P4 prices drop. I paid $330 for the P3 600 in my machine now a couple weeks after the P3 733's came out... what a difference a couple years make.


Two days ago, I was leaning towards DDR333 after reading an article that gave DDR33 in the MSI 645 Ultra an edge over the RDRAM in most cases. I wish I could find the link and figure out if they were non-biased.

Now, it seems I am leaning towards RDRAM. One concern I have though...


Which quarter are we going to see the 533 Mhz FSB, and the PC1066 RDRAM officially released, and is Intel supposed to trickle down the 533 FSB to older processors like the 1.6/1.8 like they did the Northwood? Which current motherboard is most likely to release a BIOS update and proclaim that they officially support it? I assume there would also be some voltage changes.


I also need a little advice on memory brands. Samsung or Corsair. Newegg does not seem to sell Samsung, but they have two different types of 256 MB Corsair modules... There is a $9 price difference, and the only difference in the cheaper one are the words "VALUE SELET". I assume these are of lower quality and unlikely to overclock... if I overclock... never really done it before. I was thinking of maybe pushign a 1.8 to 2.0 and leaving it at that. I don't want to shorten the life of the chip.

Which brand is better?

Thanks again for all the good advice...

 

[Beatnik]

I dunno, it's almost to the point now where the bigger
question is #1) which CPU you want, then #2) which chipset
you want. And that sort of drives what memory you are stuck with.
In our last two buys, in one case, we wanted dual-Athlon 1900+'s.
In the other case, we wanted a stable Windows single-CPU system.

If I were going to generalize, I would say DDR is the place to
be because I think RAMBUS is going to die. I think the chips you
buy today are going to be more useful if they are DDR. But in
practice you usually end up tossing/replacing memory when you
upgrade your CPU and MOBO, so I guess that is not a big argument.

So... I'd say pick your CPU and chipset first. And at that
point, you won't have a choice... so...

 

[SteelCityFan]

One more question that is pretty much unrelated....


Do I need to purchase a new Case for the P4? I was hoping just to get a good Enermax Powersuppy to put in my current case (ATX). Do all ATX P4 boards currently on the market fit into standard ATX cases, or do they need a special P4 case? I had heard this from somewhere.

THanks

 

[ToBeMe]

<< One more question that is pretty much unrelated....


Do I need to purchase a new Case for the P4? I was hoping just to get a good Enermax Powersuppy to put in my current case (ATX). Do all ATX P4 boards currently on the market fit into standard ATX cases, or do they need a special P4 case? I had heard this from somewhere.

THanks >>


No, you won't need a new case for the S478 P4.



<< also need a little advice on memory brands. Samsung or Corsair. Newegg does not seem to sell Samsung, but they have two different types of 256 MB Corsair modules... There is a $9 price difference, and the only difference in the cheaper one are the words "VALUE SELET". I assume these are of lower quality and unlikely to overclock... if I overclock... never really done it before. I was thinking of maybe pushign a 1.8 to 2.0 and leaving it at that. I don't want to shorten the life of the chip. >>


Corsair uses Samsung chips...............you're buying the same module under the Corsair name! And yes, if you want to overclock, do not get the cheapest..........



<< Which quarter are we going to see the 533 Mhz FSB, and the PC1066 RDRAM officially released, and is Intel supposed to trickle down the 533 FSB to older processors like the 1.6/1.8 like they did the Northwood? Which current motherboard is most likely to release a BIOS update and proclaim that they officially support it? I assume there would also be some voltage changes. >>


The 533FSB P4's and PC1066 RD are scheduled to appear in late May. As for support..............I think we'll just have to wait and see.........a few are now saying their boards will support both, but, I'm sure there will also be new boards which will enhance performance............