How necessary are RAM heat spreaders?
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Soldato
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Doesn't really make a difference. Just think, in laptops and other mobile devices, RAM doesn't have any real heat dissipation.
Soldato
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For gaming, it'll make little to no difference, unless, perhaps, you're using a Ryzen system?
I haven't seen any performance benchmarks with newer Ryzen/Skylake systems that do benefit from faster RAM.
No, im on an Intel system atm. Going with two 8gb sticks..
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The only caveat is it's hard to find high performance DDR4 without a heatspreader. Personally I think it's a conspiracy by watercooling manufacturers...
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Pretty much every component these days has great protection against ESD.
Unless you're shuffling across carpet while wearing synthetic clothes then touching a connected PSU grill or anything earthed before you begin is more than enough to ensure you're discharged. I've never used a static wrist band and have never blown a component in over 2 decades of building PCs for myself and others. I just wear cotton clothes while assembling or disassembling instead of my disco suit.
In over 2 decades have you never had any computer components fail then?
Of course. Due to zapping them? Not likely.
Portion of luck but DOA items: 1 Graphics Card. Had a full body heat sink so likelihood of damage from ESD from me? Tiny. Reseller confirmed faulty memory chips.
Failed after use but within warranty? Couple of HDD, a NIC a long time ago and a PSU. ESD damage to a HDD? Possible but after extended use it's more likely a manufacturing defect. ESD damage to the NIC? Possible but it was a sub AUD10 piece of garbage so anything could've gone wrong there. ESD damage to a PSU? Unless you open it, very hard to do since they're pretty much designed to handle it while encased. Have yet to have a CPU, MB or RAM fail on me.
I'm not advising anyone to not earth before touching components, the opposite in fact. However, with basic care there's no need for a wrist strap when handling PC components. Ideally you shouldn't be assembling or dissembling on carpet. If you do, then regularly touch an earthed component such as your connected (but powered off) PSU. This will do the same job as any wrist strap. Think of where the wrap strap is connect to, probably the same areas as you will be touching before you handle components anyway right? If you're on a hard surface such as wood or rubber based flooring then even better, the negative charge build up on these is very low. If you wear cotton then it's a neutral material. Unless you're in a very dry room or have very dry skin then the positive build up is also small.
As @MrRockliffe mentioned, most if not all PC components have a base resilience to ESD, these are consumer (assumed idiots) level products after all.
Not likely but impossible to say for sure. Damage from static can sometimes wound components so they fail later.
Companies such as Gigabyte and Kingston workers are grounded while handing components.
Touching an earthed surface is better then nothing, but it's not the same as a grounding strap, and why take the extra risk when a grounding strap is so cheap.
For example look at the memory section of OCUK forums, there are plenty of posts with DOA or RMA's due to failed memory tests. Manufactures test all memory before leaving factory, so have to wonder how they get damaged and if a percentage is from static damage during installation.
Yes, but there are so many points of failure that it's hard to be certain. One of my friends was certain he destroyed a sound card (back in Soundblaster as a peripheral card days) because he walked across carpet while it was in the palm of his hand and he actually smelt something after feeling a discharge. Oops.
Manufacturing lines are very different to home and they're properly grounded for a multitude of reasons. For sensitive electronics they're working in clean rooms with strict humidity control. How many people assemble a computer in such conditions? It would be unreasonable and impractical to do so.
Assuming the QA procedures of companies are faultless (not likely), components travel a long way before they end up with the consumer. Although not common, many things can happen in this time. Once some friends were building PCs for one of their small businesses. They had 5 pairs of Corsair RAM, one per PC all from the same supplier in a single order. On two of them they were experiencing erroneous errors. I was called in to help diagnose and noticed they both failed memory tests. They were effectively DAO but I noticed they had consecutive batch numbers that were different to the other 3 pairs. Likely a fault with that particular batch, be it at the factory or in transit. Possible that they were damaged by ESD but not the most likely explanation.
If using static wrist strap makes you move comfortable when handling components then certainly continue to do so. I'm merely commenting that there are plenty of people out there that don't bother and haven't had issues.
I feel the risk of not using a ground trap is minimal so don't bother using one. I just choose the right environment and wear appropriate clothing instead. Personal choice really. I also don't like to have something dangling off my wrist that can impede my flexibility or snag on something while building.
Manufacturing lines are very different to home and they're properly grounded for a multitude of reasons. For sensitive electronics they're working in clean rooms with strict humidity control. How many people assemble a computer in such conditions? It would be unreasonable and impractical to do so.
Assuming the QA procedures of companies are faultless (not likely), components travel a long way before they end up with the consumer. Although not common, many things can happen in this time. Once some friends were building PCs for one of their small businesses. They had 5 pairs of Corsair RAM, one per PC all from the same supplier in a single order. On two of them they were experiencing erroneous errors. I was called in to help diagnose and noticed they both failed memory tests. They were effectively DAO but I noticed they had consecutive batch numbers that were different to the other 3 pairs. Likely a fault with that particular batch, be it at the factory or in transit. Possible that they were damaged by ESD but not the most likely explanation.
If using static wrist strap makes you move comfortable when handling components then certainly continue to do so. I'm merely commenting that there are plenty of people out there that don't bother and haven't had issues.
I feel the risk of not using a ground trap is minimal so don't bother using one. I just choose the right environment and wear appropriate clothing instead. Personal choice really. I also don't like to have something dangling off my wrist that can impede my flexibility or snag on something while building.
Going back to not taking any anti static precaution at all, common sense says majority of the time it's going to be fine. When I was younger I mistreated components, handled them incorrect and everything appeared ok, there will be plenty of people reading this that still take this approach, majority of time they will be fine. I do agree that components have become more resistant to damage from ESD.
However you only have to have one leak on a transistor caused by static to have issues, because of this you should handle components correctly. Anyone who gets an occasional crash, who can say it's not a bad memory cell caused by ESD. To give the best possible chance for reliably then you take care, and that includes anti static straps. It's impossible to know the percent, but some RMA's must be due to static damage by customers.
My pet hate is the YouTube videos where people are reviewing components, they handle components not just without ESD precautions but they don't even hold boards by the edges, or worse they hold directly the gold contacts this putting grease on them. People see these videos and copy this approach also, then to make it worse they read people saying that ESD precautions don't really matter, then they go into a pattern of mishandling components.
However you only have to have one leak on a transistor caused by static to have issues, because of this you should handle components correctly. Anyone who gets an occasional crash, who can say it's not a bad memory cell caused by ESD. To give the best possible chance for reliably then you take care, and that includes anti static straps. It's impossible to know the percent, but some RMA's must be due to static damage by customers.
My pet hate is the YouTube videos where people are reviewing components, they handle components not just without ESD precautions but they don't even hold boards by the edges, or worse they hold directly the gold contacts this putting grease on them. People see these videos and copy this approach also, then to make it worse they read people saying that ESD precautions don't really matter, then they go into a pattern of mishandling components.
Same - I was working on an electronics project (hobby) once though and had a static discharge as I picked up the PCB board - quite a zap = dead mosfet.
