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Upgrading my RAM.

Arsenik13

Member
I have a p4p800 SE motherboard with 1.5gb of Dual Channel Cheap-o RAM (I don't even know what kind is in it) and I am wanting to upgrade the RAM.

I will NOT overclock, mainly because I have no clue how to overclock RAM. I read the anandtech Value RAM guide and really didn't understand what their tests proved. I just read my motherboard specifications and it states it will handle up to 4GB of PC3200 DDR 400 RAM. The p4p800 SE has an 800MhZ front side bus.

A few questions:

1) This mobo supports Dual Channel RAM - What are the benefits of Dual Channel RAM?

2) Can someone suggest some RAM for me and explain why it is good?
 
1. RAM isn't single or dual channel. RAM will run in dual channel if the MB supports it and you have an even number of sticks in the correct slots.

2. Just buy Value RAM such as Corsair VS. 2x1GB will be plenty.
 
The cheap-o RAM i'm assuming is DDR 333.. I bought it when I bought the computer and I was in college at the time, so I wouldn't have had money for the DDR 400
 
Dual channel ram doesn't really give a performance boost at all in games (if that's what you're doing with it.) At the most I would say 5% increase, nothing big
 
Did everyone miss the fact that he is an Intel p4p800 SE board. Intel relies alot more on memory bandwidth performance than AMD. Not running dual channel at full pc3200 speed is holding your performance back.
 
Well how much do you want? 2GB is really what anyone needs, just get 2x1GB of any Value Select Series, corsair or OCZ is good. But if you are not doing heavy stuff 1GB will be more than enough, 2x512mb Corsair value select 🙂 you run at 1T, 400mhz, dual-channel, everyone happy 😛
 
You seem to have an ASUS motherboard capable of only dual-channel DDR memory.

The FSB of your Pentium (or Celeron) processor may limit your memory speed. For example, if you're running on a 400 or 533 MHz bus, you can't benefit from anything beyond PC2700 (DDR333) memory. If, however, you have a CPU with an 800 MHz FSB, then you can use PC3200 (DDR400) memory.

Timings are of limited importance, but, generally speaking, spending an extra few dollars for 2.5-3-3-7 memory (as opposed to 3-4-4-8) is usually ideal. Spending an extra ~$50 for 2-2-2-5 memory, however, is usually not a good idea, as it yields minimal performance gain.
 
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