RAM - More of the slow, or less of the fast?

[chapster]

Hi,

My home PC (Pentium 4 3GHz with low to mid level parts running XP) which I use mainly for small time stuff, some working with large images and very rarely computer games, has 1GB of DDR2 memory in the form of two 512MB matched-pair sticks of the 800MHz type (6400).

Recently obtained four sticks of 1GB each for free, but it's 533MHz (4200) DDR2.

Which do you think would be best: keep the 1GB of faster RAM, or put in the 4GB of slower RAM?

Thanks!

 

[RavenSEAL]

4 gb of slower, when you have that much ram, and you're not HD gaming, the speed doesn't matter, the amount does. Specially, SPECIALLY when we are talking +3GB.

 

[RaiderJ]

More of the slower. Less time you have to hit the hard drive, the faster everything will be. However much slower the 533MHz RAM is, it's still WAY faster than any hard drive on the market.

 

[Emulex]

more ram. ram is much faster than ssd/hd.

 

[taltamir]

more ram is always better than faster ram. Faster ram has an infinitesimal effect on your performance speed, more ram has a MASSIVE effect (when you are running low, and eventually you will)

in your specific case its 1GB vs 4GB... in 2010 NOBODY should be using less than 4GB of ram. you will see massive speed boost, today, from going from 1GB to 4GB of ram.

 

[chapster]

Thanks all. That's settled, the 4GB is going in!

 

[Zap]

You can also try overclocking the RAM. The lower speed it starts with, the more likely a successful overclock. Aim for 667MHz and relax the latency a bit.