16GB OId Abandoned Ram.

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Joined
6 Jun 2005
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Plymouth / Cambridge
Hi,

a left over computer in our house has yielded some 16GB Ram

2X G. SKILL 8GB (2 x 4GB) PC3-12800 (DDR3-1600) Memory (F3-12800CL9D-8GBXL)

in my system i currently have some old

Corsair 12GB DDR3 10666C9 1333MHz XMS3 TwinX Tri Channel Kit (6x2GB)

is it worth Swapping this out? the extra 4gb might be useful and the ram might be a bit quicker than my current.

Thanks

P
 
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Go for it, its 267mhz faster and the same cache latency at CL9. The extra 4GB of ram will be be worth it.

Edit.. just caught on your system is triple channel.. well that is a tough choice then... not sure what I would do.

What is your computer used for mostly?
 
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OP
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6 Jun 2005
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648
Location
Plymouth / Cambridge
Cool I think it's a 6 slot but will have to check tomorrow. As long as there is no real chance of damaging the ram by using two different sets or motherboard then I'll give it a shot tomorrow. Not a great time for buying a new pc right now.
 
Soldato
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I believe my motherboard is the GA-X58A-UD7. Its pretty old now. Just like everything else on the PC. Still does the job till its the right time for the new system.
If you run 3x2 gb you have 6gb triple channel but if you add 2x8gb with 1x2gb then only 6gb will run triple channel and the other 12gb will run asynchronous so all together you will have 12gb running in triple channel and 12gb running in asynchronous.
Remember to run it at the speed of your slowest dimms else it probably won't boot.
Out of interest what CPU are you using?
 
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Soldato
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Planet Thanet
i remember having that board :)
with an i7 920 at 4ghz :)
@Joxeon
weird as it sounds mate but you can have 3 channel mode
on that motherboard
using 3,4 or 6 modules i know that doesnt sound right lol
but theres 3 memory channels and each can take 2 ram modules
i dont remember about 5 modules though as only used 3,4 and 6 on
that board when i had it but logically 5 would also be triple
as you would have modules in each of the 3 channels
but to the op if you look in cpuz in the memory tab/not spd tab
it will tell you dual or triple channel
and though it was a very long time ago thats how i remember being surprised
to see it in triple channel mode when i expected to see it say dual :):):):)
 
Soldato
Joined
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Posts
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Location
Uk
weird as it sounds mate but you can have 3 channel mode
on that motherboard
3 channel is just triple channel as I said in my previous post.

with 4 dimms you could either have it running in dual channel or triple channel but with triple channel 1 of the 4 dimms would run single channel.

The same with different size memory modules on the same channel, the smallest dimm IE the 2GB in OP case will use 2gb of the larger dimms to run triple channel while the remaining 6gb on the 2 larger dimms will run single channel

https://www.tomshardware.com/uk/reviews/ddr-dram-faq,4154-7.html
 
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