Mushkin 4GB DDR2-800 XP2-6400 4-3-3-10

Greebo

Greebo

Greebo

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Now I know these are incredible chips (for incredible money!) but are they worth it?

I have been offered a matched pair (2 x 2gb) for £120.

For that money I could have 8Gb of some good quality chips.

Would I see the benefit in my proposed new setup?

1.25VID G0 Q6600
Abit IP35 PRO
Custom watercooling.

In reviews these chips will run at 1066 MHz still at their tight timings of 4-3-3-10:eek:

http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleid=2143&page=2

So the million dollar question is: Is that enough of a gain for a £120 price tag or would these chips potential be wasted on my setup?
 
If they are really capable of that, i would get then at the blink of an eye. You're gonna end up paying a bit less for 4GB extremely good modules than what i paid for my quite standard memory about a year ago. It's a fantastic deal. I would howerver get a cheap intel mobo + a cheap C2D chip to go with it, otherwise it's almost a waste.
 
The same question could apply to any number of hardware bits inside our PCs...

Is it worth getting a Thermochill PA series over the equivalent Alphacool/Swiftech radiator for better cooling?

Is it worth buying a Velociraptor over a Samsung F1 for ultimate speed?

Is it worth stumping up for a Core 2 8200 over a 7200?


IMHO, in terms of price/performance? Absolutely not.

In terms of being able to beat your system within an inch of its life and have it come begging for more? Absolutely. :)

Which is why I'm a Velociraptor/Thermochill kind of guy. And very poor. :D

EDIT: Just realised that the penultimate paragraph is somewhat contentious in the current frenetic environment, there this post does not advocate domestic or any other form of violence towards and person, animal or inanimate object, whether verbal or physical. ;)
 
That's a fantastic response ;)

I would admit that what i wrote only applies if you have the money and think it's a worthwhile investment. If i was in your place with your system and with my tiny amount of cash, i would just wait and get a Nehalem/next-gen AMD system and some cheap DDR3 at that point, DDR3 prices are already way down.
 
Already picked up the cpu for £100 and the board brand new for £80 so no going back now!

And ddr3 still doesn't perform any better thans ddr2 and especially if these can run at 1066Mhz at 4-3-3-10.

Plus ddr3 boards are still very expensive compared to good p35 boards.

Doing a "bang for bucks" build trying to get the best for my money.

Was just going to get ordinary good quality pc6400 chips until these were offered to me.

Sooooooo tempting just to see what they can do. :)
 
Can't see any reason to get those, other than as extension to your e-penis. You can get 8gb of PC2-8000 for £110.
 
I had that Memory and paid well over £300 for it and had to RMA it.

I had nothing but trouble with it and the Speaders became loose/unbonded.

I cant remember all details but I did post it here at the time.

What is your MAX FSB(HT) speed ?.
 
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Cob said:
You can get 8gb of PC2-8000 for £110.
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Echo this TBH.

Got 8gb of OCZ PC8000 for that and haven't looked back.

You're paying for latencies that you just wouldn't see any real world benefit from. DDR2 likes speedmore than latencies so PC8000 would seem the better option here - especially as you can get double the amount for the same price.

gt
 
gt_junkie said:
Echo this TBH.

Got 8gb of OCZ PC8000 for that and haven't looked back.

You're paying for latencies that you just wouldn't see any real world benefit from. DDR2 likes speedmore than latencies so PC8000 would seem the better option here - especially as you can get double the amount for the same price.

gt
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I thought it was a balance of both which gave best returns?

Saw a link on a thread on here where somebody went in depth into speed vs latancy and from memory tight 4-4-4-10 at 900 was much better performance than 5-5-5-18 at 1100.

I'll see if I can find the link.
 
Interesting, how was it tested? Was it super-pi, benchmarking software, game fps improvement or something else?

I suppose it really depends on what you would be using it for.

I pretty much just game so i'd personally rather have something that did 5-5-5 @ 1000 and save £60 (that could be spent on a faster graphics card or equivalent) than have one that did the same at 4-3-3.

gt
 
Not found the in depth review I was looking for yet which did 3dmark,sisandra, superpi, games etc (about 20 results)

But found this link:

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=163668

And on that at 964Mhz 5-4-3-12 outperforms everything at 5-5-3-15 even when running at 1130Mhz in superpi

Note that even at 1130 is below the chips rated latency of 5-5-5-15.

Even at 872 and 4-4-3-12 does quicker than 1130Mhz in superpi.

This may not be the same result in games however so I will find that link.

Hence my belief that a balance is best. Memory running at 1000 and 4-3-3-10 will far outperform memory running at 1300 and 5-5-5-18. Unless somebody proves it to me otherwise.
 
It's up to you. If you want the best super-pi time then go for it.

However, i maintain the difference (in real world usage) is probably minute considering the massive extra cost.

gt
 
I'm not saying that I will cause still maybe not worth the money. If they were £80 then yes.

Just pointing out that speed is not the be all and end all of performance.

And you have to factor in how much it will add to my e-penis ;)
 
Greebo said:
Already picked up the cpu for £100 and the board brand new for £80 so no going back now!

And ddr3 still doesn't perform any better thans ddr2 and especially if these can run at 1066Mhz at 4-3-3-10.

Plus ddr3 boards are still very expensive compared to good p35 boards.

Doing a "bang for bucks" build trying to get the best for my money.

Was just going to get ordinary good quality pc6400 chips until these were offered to me.

Sooooooo tempting just to see what they can do. :)
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Aah i'm sorry, i was looking at the rig in your sig, for that it would have been complete overkill :)
 
The only place you'll see the benefit is in memory-bound benchies like SuperPi. It is lovely RAM though.

Good luck getting a sensible RMA for it in a year's time though. All that super-selected stuff just ends being a pain when it comes RMA time. They haven't any left and they want to offer you a refund of 30p in the £ because you've had use of it. Buy the cheap stuff and be done with it.

With a £100 CPU and £80 motherboard you'll never be able to exploit it anyway. If you have a DFI then maybe you might be able to fine-tune it properly, but for £80 it's probably not DFI....
 
WJA96 said:
The only place you'll see the benefit is in memory-bound benchies like SuperPi. It is lovely RAM though.

Good luck getting a sensible RMA for it in a year's time though. All that super-selected stuff just ends being a pain when it comes RMA time. They haven't any left and they want to offer you a refund of 30p in the £ because you've had use of it. Buy the cheap stuff and be done with it.

With a £100 CPU and £80 motherboard you'll never be able to exploit it anyway. If you have a DFI then maybe you might be able to fine-tune it properly, but for £80 it's probably not DFI....
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Your quite right - the cpu is a 1.25v Q6600 and the mobo is an ABit ip35pro. In the end I bought some corsair 6400 4-4-4-12 for £70. Seems worth it for the £50 saved.
 
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