Samsung or Corsair XMS? which better?

[brunswickite]

i am a first time builder building a new p4 system (after price cuts of course )
i basically decided i was gonna buy and i845g based board cuz of the ddr 333 compatibilty

i am leaning toward Epox4g4a+

i am plainning to OC, so i wanna get quality RAM so the question is

Samsung pc2700 or Corsiar XMS 2700?

which best for Overclocking, and compatibility

also 1 512 dimm or 2 256 dimm? does it make a differance?

thanks

 

[brunswickite]

anyone ?

 

[bjc112]

Samsung.

Edit.

I would also go for the 512 dimm...

 

[Poncherelli]

the samsung models they carry at newegg now do not oc as well as the old pc2700 ram they used to carry. I think they have the DTL models now whereas the CTL models were the good OCers (or vice versa)

 

[Ilmater]

I belive that the 812gb ram stick is in fact the most highly sought after device on the market today.... nuff said.

 

[brunswickite]

also its smarter to get Samsung pc3000 or pc3200 although the 845 g only supoorts pc2700? would i be paying a premium for not much performance?

 

[brunswickite]

Originally posted by: Ilmater
I belive that the 812gb ram stick is in fact the most highly sought after device on the market today.... nuff said.

dude u need some sleep

 

[ku]

depends on how much you want to overclock. You can get a pc2700 chip and hope that the ram will hold out. Or you can spend some extra bucks and get some relief knowing it will do a certain speed.

 

[John]

If you want the best memory for o/c'ing, go with the Samsung Original DDR400 with true 4ns chips which should run 225+ FSB.

 

[AnAndAustin]

The fastest certified JEDEC spec DDR RAM is DDR333/PC2700. Buying anything above this is not only a little risky but won't enhance your perf by leaps and bounds either. When you buy DDR400, PC3000 or PC3200 you are simply trusting the seller has hand-picked DDR333/PC2700 and thoroughly tested each and every RAM module they sell and are honest when specifying it can attain a certain speed. Many sellers aren't and most branded PC2700 o/c's just as well anyway. I have heard too many people say their RAM doesn't do what it's supposed to and IMHO it really isn't worth the risk nor the expense. Anyway this is the best link I've found:

AthlonMB checking out PC2700+ bought as a consumer NOT a reviewer

 

[CrazySaint]

Originally posted by: AnAndAustin
The fastest certified JEDEC spec DDR RAM is DDR333/PC2700. Buying anything above this is not only a little risky but won't enhance your perf by leaps and bounds either. When you buy DDR400, PC3000 or PC3200 you are simply trusting the seller has hand-picked DDR333/PC2700 and thoroughly tested each and every RAM module they sell and are honest when specifying it can attain a certain speed. Many sellers aren't and most branded PC2700 o/c's just as well anyway. I have heard too many people say their RAM doesn't do what it's supposed to and IMHO it really isn't worth the risk nor the expense. Anyway this is the best link I've found:

AthlonMB checking out PC2700+ bought as a consumer NOT a reviewer

JEDEC or not, the fact is, that the memory is certified to run at a certain speed with certain settings, and if it fails you can return it as being defective. I read the link you provided, the higher rated sticks (Corsair XMS PC3000 and Mushkin PC3000) also reached the highest speeds (by a noticable margin), so it seems to me you get what you pay for. The OCZ PC3000 didn't do too well, but its OCZ - 'nuff said.

As for Samsung vs. Corsair, GOOD Samsung PC2700 is as good or better than Corsair XMS PC2700, however finding GOOD Samsung (Samsung on Samsung, CTL instead of DTL) can be tricky, so Corsair XMS PC2700 is easier. At PC3200, the Corsair and Samsung both look good, and I haven't seen enough reviews/user results yet to be able to say which is actually better, despite their much different CAS ratings. The clear advantage that the Corsair XMS PC3200 CAS2 has over the Samsung PC3200 right now is that its available in 512MB sticks, whereas the Samsung is only available in 256MB sticks, but 512MB Sammy PC3200 should be out soon.

 

[AnAndAustin]

I wouldn't overlook the Crucial PC2700 RAM, it o/c very nearly as well as the PC3x00 stuff and costs a lot less too (esp with free delivery).

I agree that you should be able to send the RAM back if it doesn't do what it claims, but it is worth remembering that diff countries have diff laws AND it is surprising how many people just clock it lower and don't think to return it!

 

[JmsAndrsn]

Everyone keeps hyping the Samsung PC3200 but I have yet to hear anythng good about it excpet for the reviews. I picked up a stick from Newegg and it wouldn't even post in my P4B266-C or P4B533. A local computer shop tried it in a KT-266 board and no post in that board either. The same shop had an identical Samsung PC3200 module and they couldn't get their's to work either. I realize that these chipsets don't support DDR400 but most memory is usually backwards compatible.

I'm not trying to knock Samsung because I know there PC2700 is kicka$$ but I think everyone is just assuming that their PC3200 is so great just because of their PC2700. I hope I'm all wrong about this but I don't know what else to conclude at this point. I ran this by some experts in the memory field and they had concerns about the initial quality of the new chips. MS at lostcircuits.com is somehow affiliated with Mushkin. I believe he helps Mushkin develop memory or he may work for the company that makes their modules. Ram Guy is the memory product god over at Corsair's forum. Please take a look at these.

Ram Guy at Corsair forum
MS at lostcircuits.com forum

Please let me know if you've seen someone besides a reviewer praise this memory (from someone who has actually used it).

 

[JmsAndrsn]

OK...I finally found someone who has good things to say about this memory.

That person would actually be me. I was just getting ready to pack the memory up so I could ship it back to Newegg. I thought maybe the most up to date BIOS would make a difference so I upgraded my P4B533 from 1004 to 1007 and imagine my surprise when it booted up. I quickly took it up to 160 FSB with 3/4 memory divider and it booted into Win98SE withoug a probem. This puts the memory at 212 MHz/425 DDR. DDR voltage is jacked all the way up to 2.9V and I'm using the most conservative timings for right now. I tried running 3DMark2001 at this speed but I got a lockup. So it's not stable at this speed but I'm pretty sure it will end up being stable around 210 Mhz or so.

I could have been a weasel and edited my above post but I'm not afraid to admit that I was somewhat wrong. I was just a little bit disappointed when the memory wouldn't run on 3 different boards. So I guess the only thing to beware of would be that your board still may not work with the memory. You can try a BIOS update if it does not work. Good luck if you try it.

 

[John]

JmsAndrsn, thank you for your honest posts. You are using the Samsung Original DDR400 right?

 

[JmsAndrsn]

Yes, it's the originnal Samsung DDR 400...has the same same sticker as the one in the theTeaktown review and chips were made the same week (2002-week 26) and assembled the same week as well(2002-week 28).

I need to test everything at 160 FSB and 1/1 divider (using a P4 1.6a) with the new P4B533 to try and see if the CPU is really stable at 160 Mhz. Actually, I just got a random reboot at 160 FSB while running 3DMark2001 after about 20-25 screens so I'll move the Vcore up to 1.8V (from 1.775V) to see if this does anything. Looks like the CPU may be holding me back from DDR425 rather than the memory.

It's running with 2-2-2-6 at 160 FSb/160 DDR. I tried 2-2-2-5 but it wouldn't post. Now that I think about it, perhaps the faster memory timings caused the random reboot at 160 FSB.

I tried running at 150 FSB/200 DDR with 2-3-3-7 timings but it was a no go. To be honest though I don't think the faster timings are that much of a benefit with the P4 boards. I tried comparing the fastest and slowest timings with my P4B266-C and I believe the difference was only about 2% using Sandra. I know the difference was more like 5-10% using the BX chipset and the performance improvement is probably similar using AMD DDR bords.


Just out of curiousity John, have heard about any other end user experiences with these modules.

Thanks

 

[John]

I have only heard of your experience and the tweaktown review. I was considering a pair of the Samsung O DDR400 modules for my main rig because I run 166FSB and can utilize a 4:3 memory ratio (221.3MHz). My current pair of 256MB CTL Samsung O PC2700 sticks top out at 199MHz and a few memory errors when using memtest86. However I cannot justify 200.00 for a few hundred Sandra memory bench points. I spent the money on a Radeon 9700 Pro earlier today anyhow.

 

[JmsAndrsn]

Thanks John.

What motherboard are you using. Did you actually mean to say 3:4 divider because some of the newer i845 boards do actually use a 4:3 divider which would mean a 166 MHz processor running with a 124 MHz memory bus (or some ratio thereof). Hopefully your board actually offers the 3:4 divider.

Actually, that local store that I mentioned (near Dayton OH) has the same modules (same Samsung Korea sticker and same production weeks) for $89.50. Click here.. I was pretty surprised to see that they stocked this new stuff so fast. I buy a lot of stuff from them locally and have never had any problems. I've never had to get anything shipped so I don't know how their rates are. If you were to order from them, you may want to call them just to make sure you get the Samsung memory because their listing says that it could be Samsung or Micron chips (but then again Micron doesn't even make PC3200 yet...probably won't release it until JDEC approves it). You may also want to weighthe possibilities of having to return the memory if it doesn't work. Newegg normally has a 15% restocking fee but they were not going to charge it when I told them the module was defective.