2 Gigs Of Ram

[Alan Freeman]

Hi i was wondering if i upgrade from 1 gig to 2 gigs will i see a big boost in performance or is it a waist of money.

My system specs are:

p4 3.2 hyperthreading
1gig of generic ram
x800 pro 256
22" LCD syncmaster 213T

i currently have 4 X 256 sticks

 

[Neutrino]

1 gig is already quite a lot for current games. I really doubt you would see much of a performance increase. However, I don't have any personal experience testing that much ram so I could be wrong.

 

[Alan Freeman]

1 gig is already quite a lot for current games. I really doubt you would see much of a performance increase. However, I don't have any personal experience testing that much ram so I could be wrong.

Thanks i doubt anyone here has or knows anyone with 2 gigs

 

[Neutrino]

Thanks i doubt anyone here has or knows anyone with 2 gigs

Well, wait a bit though. I'm sure one of the hardware gurus around here can better tell you what to expect.

One thing though is it never hurts to get more ram since it seems games are really going to start pushing the envelope over the next couple years. But then again it might be better to just save the money for later when you actually need an upgrade. That way you would get more for your money at least.

 

[StainlessJ-FPGA]

Waste of money. No performance gain. Wait another... year maybe.

 

[Top Secret]

Waste of money. No performance gain. Wait another... year maybe.

Exactly. We're running out of video memory, not system.

 

[antimatter]

How fast is your ram? You could see a performance boost if you actually upgraded the speed of your ram.

 

[Maxi]

You might see a performance increase if you'd change your ram to 2 x 512, If your motherboard supports dual channel memory.

 

[Sgt_Shellback]

Well he never said performance gain in Half-Life. Yes you would see a performance gain if you do a lot of data processing

 

[[Matt]]

I have another gig of ram in my other system and just for kicks i tried it out in my main gaming rig. I saw no performance gain whatsoever in my games. However those damn memory reference errors in hl2 dissapeared completely...

 

[v1p3r]

You only need more than 1gig if you do mega Photoshop/CAD/3D work

 

[slicer]

do you realy have room for more, most computers dont have room for more than 4 ram bricks

 

[Flamin-h]

In some benchmarks going from one gig to two gigs actucaly decreased performance (by a stupidly small amount).

 

[blackeye]

If your just using your rig for games then dont bother getting two gigs. Howevor if you do graphic work and videoediting adding an extra gig of ram can help dramitaclly. I think I will be getting another gig of ram as soon as I get the money because when Im multitasking sometimes I will use over a gig of ram and some of the swap file.

 

[holydeadpenguins]

Make sure your fsb is fast enough. On an athlon 64 you will have a fast enough bus for anything.

 

[Asus]

If you keep your current 1GB of memory and just add more memory for a total of 2GBs then your performance will be like this.
If you buy 2 1GB sticks and throw the other 512MB sticks out then it should be fine.
But again, 2GB is mostly wasteful for now.

 

[Alan Freeman]

If you keep your current 1GB of memory and just add more memory for a total of 2GBs then your performance will be like this.
If you buy 2 1GB sticks and throw the other 512MB sticks out then it should be fine.
But again, 2GB is mostly wasteful for now.

thanks ill wait then thanks fot the help

 

[LostBok]

Agreed - 4 x 256DIMMS is a step down in performance compared to 2 x 512Mb dimms - not sure if you'd be better off with 2 x 256's. I've got 3 x 512's in my system and I know most memory intensive stuff (games) are better off with just 2 dimms and more aggressive memory timings.

I doubt if it'll make any difference to add more than 1Gb RAM: when I tried for force HL2 to increase the heapsize beyond 512Mb it wouldn't launch. "-heapsize 512000" was the highest I could get it!

Performance tips for gaming in general: you might find that running the PC in non-HT mode gives you more performance, not tried it on HL2 yet, so not 100% sure. Definitely makes a decent sized difference on some other apps I've tried it on: a 3.06Ghz P4 with HT switched off will comfortably outpace a 3.2Ghz with HT "on" for software that isn't designed to use two CPU's. 2.8Ghz (HT off) and 3.2Ghz (HT on) are approximately on a par.

Remember to change your XP system files (ACPI drivers) into single CPU mode first - I know I really mucked things up in win2000 once when I tried to do this!

BUT before you much around with memory or CPU settings: sort out your screen - that's almost certianly the weak point: a 21.3" Samsung Syncmaster 213T has a response rate of 25ms, so you'll probably be getting a little bit of ghosting, not dropped frames.

Try plugging your graphics card into an old CRT or high performance TFT screen (16ms or lower) and see if that makes any difference - reviews tend to be mixed on the 213T for gaming - lots comments like "less ghosting that other 21" TFT's".

e.g. "We noticed that in comparison to other 25ms pixel refresh rate screens at 15" and 17", the ghosting on the Samsung 213T appeared to be much more prevalent. Perhaps being on such a large screen just amplifies whatever ghosting the monitor has. In my experience with LCD monitors (we've reviewed an awful lot here), I would say that the Samsung 213T has the visual look of a 35ms pixel refresh screen. " from http://www.gamepc.com/labs/view_content.asp?id=samsung213t&page=5

 

[Alan Freeman]

Thanks for the info lost BOK thanks alot

 

[steelslay]

running apps

it will not show mutch were it counts,were it will show tho is if you had lots of apps running, i have just over 2gig and i slugged my pc out the other day just to see if i could have twice as mutch running as before as i also had 1 gig of ram not so long back, well the test was true i could run twice as many apps

 

[FieryGoose]

if you have 2 sticks of 512 (ddr ram) would you stick both of the sticks in the same channel or one in each channel?

 

[LostBok]

look in yr mobo manual...

I've just "downgraded" from 1.5Gb to 1Gb (2 x Corsair twinX 3200cas2 and 1 x Corsair XMS PC3500(433Mhz)cas2).... both will run >400Mhz at cas2, but together they were v unstable at aggressive memory timings... 1Gb (jsu tthe 2 x twinX modules and I'm back at pretty quick memory timings (2-2-3-6).

I checked: HalfLife2 pretty much NEVER goes about 950Mb memory (inc all the other stuff running in the background in XPSP2).

 

[FieryGoose]

i did look in the manual but it is not very noob friendly, on most motherboards that supports dual channel memory do the chips go in the same channnel (2 in channel 1) or do each go in a different channel (1 in channel 1, and 1 in channel 2) i only have 2 sticks of 512, 1 gb total pc3200. It's just kind of confusing to me... thanks lostbok, and any other information would also be appriciated.

 

[Darkknighttt]

what do you need 2 gigs of ram for?!?!?!?!?!

 

[bosox188]

In addition to it being 4x256mb, he said his ram is generic. It may actually be better to get 2x512mb of high quality ram, or go with Asus' suggestion of waiting a bit more for good 2x1GB.

 

[Kommie]

Are you having performance problems? because with a system like that you really shouldn't. And yes I am sure it will run BF2

 

[trizzm]

i just ordered 2gb of corsair xms3200C2 to go with my new 3500+, it was a fair bit expensive but something tells me that later this year i'll be damned happy to have picked up the extra gb.
i know it's superfluous right now but maybe i'll be able to brag in front of my friends while playing games with a Reason mix running in the background in the mean time with good FPS

anyway i'll tell you about it once i get it.

 

[Sgt_Shellback]

People spouting off on the speed barrier of 2 gigs is bull... Clock me when I fill 1 Gig and have to go to the hard drive vs the speed bump of having 2 gigs.

If you need 2 gigs get it.

 

[DEATH eVADER]

Thanks i doubt anyone here has or knows anyone with 2 gigs

I was going to attempt that but no.

Might be better getting sticks with higher frequency ratings

(PC3200 = 400MHZ)

I had PC2100 = 266MHZ, and I think it has served its life, time to change