2 GB PC3200 CL2 dual channel for Nforce 4 board

fish99 · 9 Aug 2006 at 01:37

Hi,

I'm looking to upgrade to 2GB and since my board is NForce 4 that means my old Twinmos ram has to go, which is fine. Looking for PC3200, dual channel kit, that will work with my Asus A8N5X Nforce 4 board, that will be stable running 1T, and preferably CL2.

Not interested in overclocking so it doesn't need to go above 200 Mhz. Was interested in the G.Skill ZX but that's out of stock now. Don't see many options on OcUK actually, except this one-

Corsair 2GB DDR XMS3200C2PT TwinX (2x1GB) CAS2 for £152.69

Anyone used this with an Nforce 4 board (especially an Asus) and will it do 1T ok? Does it fit my other requirements? Looks ideal to me and should be nice and quick :cool:

Cheers,
Simon.

fish99 · 9 Aug 2006 at 09:45

Right, I've been reading the FAQ and this is what it says about memory timings-

CAS (2.5 or 2) = Lower gives significant performance increase
tRAS (7,6 or 5) = Gives very small performance increase
tRCD (2, 3 or 4) = Lower gives significant performance increase
tRP (2, 3 or 4) = Gives very small performance increase
CMD (1T, 2T or 3T) = Lower gives very significant performance increase
Bank Interleave (None, 2B or 4B) = Higher gives very significant performance increase.

So, if we're talking about 2/3/3/6 then those settings are CAS/tRCD/tRP/tRAS according to my research. So the important ones are CAS and tRCD, and then CMD and Bank Interleave, which for some reason aren't given in memory specs.

So in a situation where the CMD and Bank Interleave settings aren't given, what else can you do apart from looking for low CAS and tRCD? Also overclocking or not, the memory timings are still going to affect performance a little, and with the difference between 2-3-3-6 and 3-3-3-8 ram under £20, isn't it worth going for the quicker ram?

Sorry if I'm talking rubbish btw

Want to make sure I get this right though, since it is a gaming rig and I'll be stuck with this ram for quite a while probably.

Cheers
Simon.

fish99 · 9 Aug 2006 at 14:40

Yeah, I did notice when changing my current ram from 2T to 1T my Doom 3 timedemo went from 98.5 fps to 100.1 fps. Not exactly anything to get excited about.

Cheers for the advice

fish99 · 10 Aug 2006 at 11:10

Brilliant, I can buy it with a good degree of confidence that it'll be compatible now.

Thanks very much