System Building Advice

[PSLegacy]

For off let me thank all replies in advance should tact and manners escape me in the future....

Here is the deal:

At my workplace we are assembling a number of workstations with the following parts:

Core2 Duo E8400 (3.0GHz, 1333 FSB)
4GB DDR2 800 RAM
ASUS P5E VM DO (Q35 Chipset)
160GB HDD
DVD/DVD-RW

Pretty straightforward stuff.....

Here is the dilemma: I feel that we should NOT change the memory frequency on the RAM, right now one of the guys feels we should set the frequency to 667MHz to better match the CPU FSB....I feel we are loosing out on memory bandwidth, he says we are not....can anybody enlighten me/us on this?

 

[disports]

I believe the ram will be running at DDR2-667 anyways since the CPU is running at stock speeds. It'll run at DDR2-800 when you set the FSB in the BIOS to 400 (which would make your CPU run at 3.6 GHz).

 

[Denithor]

If you run a 1:1 divider the memory will run at DDR2-667 and you will lose a little bandwidth. But that won't really make any difference in performance in 99.x% of the applications out there.

Better yet, if these aren't "mission critical" systems you could always OC them to 3.6GHz (9x400fsb) and run the memory 1:1 at stock speed.

 

[disports]

You'll have to make sure they're stable then too! ;D

 

[Quiksilver]

Out of curiosity why the Q35 chipset? Why not G35, P35, P45, G45, etc.?

 

[DSF]

You are technically losing some memory bandwidth, but the impact of that loss on performance in an Intel system is minimal. If you're worried about it, assemble one of the machines and check its performance against your applications at both memory speeds.

 

[Blain]

Originally posted by: PSLegacy
Here is the deal:

Core2 Duo E8400 (3.0GHz, 1333 FSB)
4GB DDR2 800 RAM
ASUS P5E VM DO (Q35 Chipset)
160GB HDD
DVD/DVD-RW

Pretty straightforward stuff.....

Here is the dilemma: I feel that we should NOT change the memory frequency on the RAM, right now one of the guys feels we should set the frequency to 667MHz to better match the CPU FSB....I feel we are loosing out on memory bandwidth, he says we are not....can anybody enlighten me/us on this?

1. The guy that wants 667 is way off base. That speed neither matches the memory or the CPU.
2. Run the memory at what it's rated... 400 (800) FSB. I hope it's specification is the standard 1.8v. You don't want some "gaming" RAM that needs the voltage jacked up to 2.0 or higher just to run at default speed.
It's a workstation, not SLI gaming rig.

 

[PSLegacy]

Thank you all, again.

Why the Q35? I honestly do not know...the boss picked it out, what can i say. The only reason I can even guess is that it has integrated graphics (which for the application and end user is fine)...I know weak....

We are using standard specifications no "gaming" gear here. I think I got what I came for.