Quad Channel VS Dual Channel

[simplynluv]

Hi people

I just need to know several things for Quad Channel memories and Dual Channels memories
(I will use 3820 on Quad Channels / 2700k or 2600 on Dual Channels

Says I'm going to use it for 3d Rendering on 3dsMax/Maya as well Photoshop CS5 programs, and I'm running on single GTX 580 on my computer

which one will perform faster and provide better performance for 3d Rendering? or it has no effects on rendering? (I'm using V Ray for my renderer) :biggrin:

 

[Arcanedeath]

performance should be similar but you can add more cheaper ram with 8 slots instead of 4 slots so for your apps it would be better getting 3820 since your programs use a lot of ram.

 

[pandemonium]

I'm no expert since I don't do it myself, but a little googling and I found several locations that mention RAM speed doesn't matter nearly as much as amount of RAM, such as this:

http://forums.cgarchitect.com/39416-vray-hardware.html

RAM has nothing to do with rendering speed. Well, as long as you're not using more than you have. If your scene requires 3GB and you only have 2GB, it has to store the extra 1GB on the hard drive, and the swapping data between them takes some time. But if your scenes before were only 1.5GB, you won't really see any benefits in terms of speed. That's 100% the CPU power. The graphics card just powers the viewport, so the better the graphics card, the faster your viewport speed.

Hope that answers your question.

 

[simplynluv]

I plan to use 16GB of RAM..

I guess I will try to googling around meanwhile..

Thanks for the comments anyways people

:biggrin:

 

[greenhawk]

I'm no expert since I don't do it myself, but a little googling and I found several locations that mention RAM speed doesn't matter nearly as much as amount of RAM, such as this

I would think most of those articles refer to timings on the RAM, not the quad vs dual issue.

As to if it would help (quad over dual), it should when dealing with large amounts of data or if your cpu's are starved for data.

How much though varies, and properly not enough to pay several $100 more.

 

[greenhawk]

I plan to use 16GB of RAM..

at that size it does not really matter as 4GB sticks (dual channel allows upto 4 sticks) are not too bad price wise. Some I was looking at where $100 for the 16GB. If you wanted 32GB, then RAM cost alone would be reason to go quad channel (getting 8 ram slots) as 32GB using 8GB sticks is about $300 (at last check).

 

[fastman]

From my research with the programs you described, the 3820 will benefit you. As it does better in synthetic bench marks and mathematical computations.

 

[simplynluv]

Hmm....

I will hold my plan for a while
But I might go for 3820 for now..

I'm checking the price in singapore right now

wish me luck people

 

[JAG87]

Don't waste your money on SB-E if you're only going with a quad core. A 2700K will be just as good or better yet a 3770K soon will be better and cheaper, and since you're only planning 16GB of ram, Z68/Z77 is enough.

But to be honest, you're in one of those fields that could really use 12 threads, so I would consider X79 and a 3930K...

 

[simplynluv]

Don't waste your money on SB-E if you're only going with a quad core. A 2700K will be just as good or better yet a 3770K soon will be better and cheaper, and since you're only planning 16GB of ram, Z68/Z77 is enough.

But to be honest, you're in one of those fields that could really use 12 threads, so I would consider X79 and a 3930K...

True Dude..
that is why I'm was thinking to get 3820 instead of 2700k / 3770k - maybe (and hopefully) if I'm success and get more cash, I might upgrade to 3960k (3960X is just too much) without changing the mobo..

3770k is already on sale on some shop in singapore (I saw it on their price list and it was listed as on sale)
I might going check it out later and hear what they say..

Thank you so much Mr Jag, I appreciate your comment

I honestly quite tight on budget.. 1200USD is ready, but if possible, i want to save it too

 

[aaksheytalwar]

Quad ch will be like 10-15% faster in extreme real world cases

 

[greenhawk]

I honestly quite tight on budget..

Beside skip the quad channel then. What you want is possibly with dual channel (16GB) and not at a silly price and the cpu is not much slower (most of the speed for SB-E is wider memory and larger cache). If only looking at the 4 core SB-E, better to go for the 2600 CPU. (8MB cache vs the 10MB in the low end SB-E) and similar everything else.

Could save money and go the i5-2500 but you are now at 6MB cache and then difference in performance might become more noticable (but that is a $200 CPU vs the $330 odd i7-2700 and $330 odd cheap SB-E).

cost wise, going any lower than the i5-2500 and it does allow you to upgrade, but the i3's are slower again with less cache and only 2 hardware cores.

Cache of course being rather useful when using large data sets and lots of ram

 

[simplynluv]

hmmm...

Since I'm dealing with big data (my files sometimes goes up to 2GB)
I think I will going to 3820 + 16GB RAM

I did animation rendering sometimes.. so I guess I will take Quad Channel for now

but I'm still waiting for 3770k words from people
:biggrin:

 

[mhill8]

Half a year after this thread, I'm looking at the same issues; maybe some of the hardware has changed, but I have very similar questions. To wit:

I plan on buying an LGA2011 mobo and 3930K hex-core. My priorities are (1) running Gentoo, (2) gaming (via Wine), and (3) possibly running VMs using ESXi (work-related).

Gentoo involves frequent compiles which can be spread across all cores; not all games will use multiple cores. I'm toying with the idea of a dual-socket mobo so I can have 12 cores, but money will probably dictate otherwise. :^/

I'm kind of out of my depth in DDR3 memory technology, though. I have read enough reviews to understand that higher memory speeds and higher density modules pretty much dictate higher CAS latencies, and that higher speeds enable greater bandwidth on contiguous reads/writes, while CAS latencies affect random access waits. I have no idea which pattern dominates my ordinary usage, but apparently I can run memory slower and decrease the latency if that's more of an issue.

First of all, is my understanding more or less correct? Second, I'd like to take advantage of DDR3's insane prices and populate all 8 slots--I'd be happy with either 32GB or 64GB, depending on what speed & capacity are affordable. But I don't understand if you can buy two dual-channel kits (i.e., 2x2 sticks) and use them as quad channel? I assume so, but I don't know if there's some difference between the RAM modules. Or is it just marketing for "buy 4 sticks" vs. "buy 2 sticks"?

Also, I can compare sticks of various speeds, sizes, and latencies for price; how much difference do you think CAS 8 will make vs. 9 or 10? Is it worth even bothering (for more $$) to get random access from 12.5ns down to 11.25 or 10ns?

Finally, I'm not really clear on overclocking... I've read about it over the years, but never tried it. I'd rather keep my system within safe boundaries (especially with such an expensive CPU) than spend lots of time rebooting and tweaking... but I think the "unclocked" K processor means CPU and/or memory can be separately (over)clocked, without affecting the other bus speeds. If so, would there be any benefit to buying RAM rated for 1866 vs. 1600, and clocking the memory at that speed?

Sorry for so many ignorant questions, but I would like to get the best benefit out of the RAM I buy. Maybe I'm overthinking it all and I could just buy the cheapest (trusted brand) 1600 at CAS10 in four dual-pack 8GB sticks and everything would be great; if so, I'd appreciate hearing that, too. :^)

Thanks in advance for educating me!