SDRAM question

[old.FLAMMABLE1029]

My friend is buying a custom built computer and he rang me today to ask if 256mb pc100 SDram was better than 128mb pc133 SDram.

I think 256mb pc100 is better but i wanted to check.

thx

 

[old.venturer01]

ho ho ho
a real question
well i think 1 128 @ 133 mhz is better as you can get another one later, the 256 @ 100 mhz will go in the bin when he/she gets ram @ 133 mhz.

 

[old.venturer01]

unless you are looking to buy the 256 @ 100 mhz off you m8 in a month or 2

 

[Wij]

That depends. What CPU/Chipset ? What stuff do u run ?

 

[old.TUG]

Get PC133... same damn price and more future proof. Also better bandwidth, even if you're @ 100MHz FSB

 

[old.FLAMMABLE1029]

Im not sure what speed FSB motherboard he is getting but it sounds like 128 @ 133 is better alround anyway.

Thanx

[Edited by FLAMMABLE1029 on 06-01-01 at 12:45]

 

[old.Donk]

Yeah get 128@133. I've been using Crucial ram which i'm happy with, though only tried up to 138fsb @2,2,2

 

[old.hazzeryoda]

Hi, thanks Tom, aka flammable.

Im the guy getting this system and it is a 900mhz Athlon T-Bird. I was told by the guys at the place im getting it from that an upgrade from the std 128MB PC133 to 256MB PC100 RAM wouldnt matter because an increase of 33mhz wouldn't do much to a Athlon TBird. Is this correct or shall i stay with 128 PC133mhz?

I will be running it on an Asus A7V motherboard as well.

 

[old.MeanMrMustard]

I am aka MeanMrMustard

I ditched flammable since i have more posts as MMM

 

[old.hazzeryoda]

A7V133

hi tom

 

[Wij]

A TBird will probably work better with 128meg PC133 rather than 256meg PC100 on a KT133 mobo. At least in 98/ME. Win2K likes a bit more than 128 meg often tho.

 

[bodhi]

Errrr, get 256 Meg of PC133? Seeing as there is a 2 quid price difference?

 

[Wij]

True.

CAS3 PC133 is dirt cheap now.

 

[old.Quorthon]

Lads is there much of a difference between cas 2 and cas 3?

I notice that overclockers.co.uk are selling 128mb of PQI pc133 (I presume cas3) for summat like £46, but 128mb crucial pc133 (cas 2) is £70. Is there that much of a performance diff between the two?

Q

 

[old.Quorthon]

Oh and why has the price of ram fallen so much in the past couple of months? Is it cos mem manufacturers are gearing up for DDr etc?


Q

 

[Wij]

Difference is noticable in timedemos. You might gain a few fps.

Mem is cheap simply cos supply is greater than demand. Memory manufacturers have to guess how much they will need to make in advance (it's not easy to change from manufacturing one type of thing to another.) This time they estimated too high meaning the market is flooded. It happens all the time so prices go up and down a lot.

 

[old.Quorthon]

Yeah but Wij, is it worth the price difference?

I have PC100 atm, with a P3600 and GF DDr rig. I will be looking over the next few mths to upgrade, and in terms of Ram, the same site has 256mb of Kingston PC133 for £100. The Crucial 256mb Cas2 is £156, which is a fair difference. What Im trying to ascertain is whether this will give me a difference in terms of merely theoretical memory throughput benches, or whether I will see a visible realistic real world performance difference for my 56 quid?

£56 = 24 pints of guinness you know

Q

 

[old.TUG]

lol don't buy crucial from OcUK as they make about 30 quid a stick

http://www.crucial.com/uk

betta source for a comparable price.

 

[old.MeanMrMustard]

are all OCuk prices rip-offs then because i was considering buying some Hardware from them. If they make that much profit then they can f00k off

 

[old.Quorthon]

hmmm, maybe the mem prices for crucial are ott, but as far as i can see, the proccy/mobo bundles are hard to beat in terms of value. TUG is there better?


Q

 

[Wij]

Well with Crucial you're paying for the name and reputation as well as the CAS2 spec. If you can find some CAS2 for about 20 quid more than CAS3 it'll be worth it imo. 56 quid I'd say was better spent on booze

Having said that I might order some myself cos I'm sad like that

 

[Wij]

For info. Dabs sells Crucial 256meg DIMM PC133 CAS2 for £138 after VAT. Saving of nearly 20 squid.

 

[old.Anatoly]

Scan are doing some 128Mb pc-133 CAS2 ram for 63.45 inc vat, which seems like quite a bargain.

http://www.scan.co.uk/memory.htm

Apparently it is (CL2) Spec Mosel Original whatever that means, which I've never heard of. Has anyone else?

As an aside there is a link on the BW news page to a review of some Mushkin CAS2 ram, where they find that changing from CAS3 to CAS2 increased the memory bandwidth by 33% at 100MHz Bus speed.

[Edited by Anatoly on 11-01-01 at 15:31]

 

[Ono]

!

 

[old.TUG]

Yep they have nice bundle prices

I used to work there u know

 

[old.MeanMrMustard]

I have my own question.

Would pc133 work on a motherboard that didn't support pc133 as i have found a hot deal and it doesn't have it in pc100.

 

[old.frankie]

it would work at anything under 133 mhz

and still better than normal pc100 stuff caus itll be more forgiving to memory timings.

 

[old.TUG]

and it should even give you increased memory bandwidth

 

[old.Donk]

Just get PC133 ram and be done with it.

I've used Crucial - ordered direct with no hassle and it's delivered pretty quick.

Any other niggling little q's you could look at their simple faq

http://support.crucial.com/scripts/ukcrucial.exe/faq

 

[old.MeanMrMustard]

I didn't realise that RAM cost so little these days.