ram qs: crucial or mushkin? & 2 256 or 1 512?

[dolph]

i'm on a epox 8kha+ & athlon 1800 xp. i might delve into a little overclocking later on. the mushkin 512 basic is only $122, and even the special ram is $149 (+$6 shipping), way beating crucial's prices (it's $83 now for 256, even with the 15% off). it seems that the mushkin is a better deal overall, but i'm not exactly sure what the performance difference would be between the mushkin basic and special (linked here). plus, i heard somewhere that i would actually be better off having 2 256s instead of 1 512; is there any truth to that? thanks in advance!

I also might have the option of buying 2 256 centon sticks from cc for ~$40 each, should i just get that and be done with it all, or fleabay it and use the proceeds towards the name brand stuff?

 

[mschell]

Most of the lower priced Mushkin is actually Crucial/Micron ram. The chips have the mt desination and are usually -7.5 speed. The Centron ram is usually Nanya chips with a -7 rating. This allows CAS 2 at the default 266MHz freq. I've found the Centron/Nanya to clock higher than Crucial so that would be my pick.

 

[jiffylube1024]

remember, you can usually only run 2 sticks of double-banked DDR RAM (pretty much every stick above 64 MB or so is double-bank) in any P4 DDR system (like the P4B266) so getting 2 sticks instead of 1 is always better (especially if you want to get more in the future).

 

[dolph]

mschell (buncha questions here):to what rating does the -7.5 and the -.7 refer? how much higher can the centon be clocked than the mushkin/crucial (even the "special" mushkin?)? & is there any way i can tell if the centon is nanya or not by looking at the ram itself, or do i have to install it to find out?
jiffylube: (i got this from mushkin's page)

Unregistered SDRAM limits the maximum frequency you can run SDRAM reliably with out having to introduce latencies, the reason is that more chips connected to the memory bus the greater the capacitance load.
Higher capacitance loads require more current to drive the signals to the valid voltage levels. So for the best memory bus performance, the less DIMMS the better (we've seen numerous examples of this, where a board will run stable with one DIMM, but lose stability once more DIMMs are added). Of course, less memory may result in better ?benchmark performance? for your memory subsystem, but if you don't have enough memory for your applications then there will be an even bigger performance hit on the performance of your whole system than just running your memory at CAS 3.
So if you need more and better memory performance it?s best to select a DIMM with the highest memory density supported by your motherboard's chipset (check your motherboard manual). This results in less chips connected to the memory bus, therefore your memory bus will see less capacitance load.

you specifically mentioned p4; i'm running an athlon. does it make a difference? plus, it seems contrarian that if i wanted to upgrade my amount of ram in the future, i should get 2 sticks now instead of just one 😕.


thanks to both you guys for responding, and for potential future responses too!

 

[mschell]

The -7, -7.5 etc refer to the refresh time in ns (nano seconds) the chips are rated. A lower number basically means faster ram all things being equal. Fast chips on a mediocre PCB (module board) will clock slower than on a good PCB. This is where vendors like Muskin come in. They take good grade chips and put them on a good PCB, the result is memory that will clock higher than average.

The Nanya Centron will have chips marked Nanya, a string of numbers and a -7. I don't know if Centron is producing memory with other chip brands.
I believe the "Special Mushkin" is their CAS 2 variety, which would be similar to the Centron, but I think Mushkin test individual modules to make sure they do indeed run CAS 2(refresh every 2 clock ticks) and 2-2-3 memory timings, which correspond, to the Turbo or Ultra settings in many BIOS setups.
Keep in mind that memory is rated at it's default speed. When you run the memory at a higher than default speed you generally have to relax the CAS rating, 2 to 2.5 and the memory timings from Turbo to Normal. This is why it's hard (impossible) to find PC 2700 memory with a CAS 2 rating.

Module compatibility with your particular motherboard plays an important part of any memory decision. Motherboard mfgrs. test designs with different major memory manufacture modules and tweak things to get them working. If they didn?t test your particular modules then you are beta testing yourself. It's best to post on the motherboard forum your board model and the memory you would like to use to see of others success (or failure), it can save you some grief and some $$ also.