2gb or 3gb

[Red and White]

Running windows XP. Athlon 4400+ X2 @2.29Ghz

I have the option of 3gb in the form of one 2gb stick @ 800mhz and one 1gb stick at 667mhz. am i right in thinking that means 3gb @ 667mhz?

or is it better to stick with the one 2gb stick running at 800mhz.

 

[bledd]

I'd stick with 2gb @800, it won't be dual channel if you start putting in odd numbers

 

[Admiral Huddy]

The sticks will run at the slower frequency. Ideally, you want two sticks of equal ram to take advantage of the dual channel.

 

[Red and White]

I'd stick with 2gb @800, it won't be dual channel if you start putting in odd numbers

i thought that would be the case but i wasnt sure if the extra 1gb would be more beneficial than the loss of dual channel.

 

[Red and White]

The sticks will run at the slower frequency. Ideally, you want two sticks of equal ram to take advantage of the dual channel.

thought so. thank you.

i have 2 sticks of the 2gb but only running 32 bit xp so im maxed out at 3gb

 

[Admiral Huddy]

I would still be beneficial to use the 2x2gb sticks on a 32bit Windows system, even though not all the memory is accessable.

 

[Red and White]

I would still be beneficial to use the 2x2gb sticks on a 32bit Windows system, even though not all the memory is accessable.

PC wont boot with them both in for some reason. just ran crucial mem checker and it seems to think the maximum this pc will take is 3gb.

 

[Admiral Huddy]

Check your motherboard manufacturer for a BIOS update. It should boot with the aforementioned configuration.

That said, having extra capacity is always better than the extra bandwith of dual channel anyway, so running 3gb of unpaired stick will be fine..

 

[bledd]

In XP, there isn't a massive performance jump from 2gb to 4gb (or 3gb) for your average task

In Vista/7, there's a noticeable jump

 

[Red and White]

In XP, there isn't a massive performance jump from 2gb to 4gb (or 3gb) for your average task

i didnt think so but thought as it was going spare i might as well stick it in.

just flashed the bios, release notes said nothing of adding support for extra ram so im not holding out much hope but it only takes a minute to see