8gb Ram, low-profile

a03dugga · 12 Feb 2012 at 20:25

Hey guys,

I was wondering if anyone could recommend some decent low-profile memory, about 8gb's. I need the clearance as i have the silver arrow cooler and my ocz reaper ram is very big and have had to place it in the other slots for now, with my cooler in a less-than-optimal configuration.

Is this alright? http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MY-290-CS&groupid=701&catid=8&subcat=1517

Or can you spec me better?

If it helps, my current mobo is:

Asrock ExtremE4 Gen3.
i5 2500k oc @ 4.6Ghz.
Thermaltake Silver Arrow CPU Cooler.

Surveyor · 12 Feb 2012 at 22:09

That RAM is fine.

I have 16GB of it myself and it's sweet as.

Remember it's only that price until Wednesday morning.

The only other thing a bit cheaper worth considering is this:

Crucial Ballistix Sport 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C10 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit £31.99

You won't go wrong with either kit.

a03dugga · 12 Feb 2012 at 22:14

Moneys not so much of a problem, what would you go for personally?

Surveyor · 12 Feb 2012 at 22:21

a03dugga said:
Moneys not so much of a problem, what would you go for personally?

The Corsair you picked originally.

a03dugga · 12 Feb 2012 at 22:47

A friend of mine who is a supplier said he could help me out and get it for me on the cheap, would this be a better choice? https://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MY-319-CS

Surveyor · 12 Feb 2012 at 22:52

With Sandy Bridge there's very little performance increase with anything above 1600MHz.

Also on the Sandy Bridge motherboards I've seen you can set the RAM speed to 1866MHz or 2133Mhz, not 2000MHz.

You'd probably have to use 1866MHz and the performance boost from that is very small.

If it costs much more than a 1600MHz kit it's probably not worth it.

a03dugga · 12 Feb 2012 at 22:55

Surveyor said:
With Sandy Bridge there's very little performance increase with anything above 1600MHz.

Also on the Sandy Bridge motherboards I've seen you can set the RAM speed to 1866MHz or 2133Mhz, not 2000MHz.

You'd probably have to use 1866MHz and the performance boost from that is very small.

If it costs much more than the a 1600MHz kit it's probably not worth it.

Ahh yes your right, i just checked my mobo. That's a shame.
I was also thinking of possibly paying a bit more and getting a 16gb kit.
Is this any good? Its wayy lower than the g.skill for some reason.
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MY-112-KS

Also, why is it that it reduces these operating speed? Is there any particular reason?

Surveyor · 12 Feb 2012 at 23:03

a03dugga said:
Ahh yes your right, i just checked my mobo. That's a shame.
I was also thinking of possibly paying a bit more and getting a 16gb kit.
Is this any good? Its wayy lower than the g.skill for some reason.
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MY-112-KS

There's absolutely nothing wrong with that kit.

You can use the XMP profile which will set the correct speed and timings but it will also set the voltage to 1.65V which is bad for Sandy Bridge.

I'd suggest enabling the XMP profile and setting the voltage manually to, say, 1.55V.

You can increase the voltage a bit at a time if you get issues but ideally stay within the Intel recommended maximum of 1.575V and certainly no more than the absolute maximum of 1.6V recommended by OcUK.

If it runs fine at 1.55V then you can leave it at that or try reducing it a touch further if you wish.

Of couse you could buy two 8GB kits of the Corsair RAM for less.

a03dugga · 12 Feb 2012 at 23:07

Ahh cool cool. Thanks bud.
You don't think 16gb is overkill do you?

Mind you it would, and i hate to say this word, "future-proof" me in terms of required ram, would it not?

Surveyor · 12 Feb 2012 at 23:18

For most people 8GB is enough.

It's enough for general use, gaming and most "serious" work.

I upgraded both my systems to 16GB, it seemed rude not to given how cheap DDR3 is.

I'll probably see little benefit out of it but it's better to have too much than not enough and we might see the benefits in a year or two.

But I'll probably have moved on to something new by then anyway.

I suppose I should confirm you have a 64 bit operating system so you can use more than 4GB?

a03dugga · 12 Feb 2012 at 23:41

I do indeed bud, 64 bit win7.
So it wont hurt to have more, i could do with setting up a ramdisk, so why not ehh.

Thanks Surveyor, much appreciated.

Craig321 · 12 Feb 2012 at 23:50

a03dugga said:
Hey guys,

I was wondering if anyone could recommend some decent low-profile memory, about 8gb's. I need the clearance as i have the silver arrow cooler and my ocz reaper ram is very big and have had to place it in the other slots for now, with my cooler in a less-than-optimal configuration.

Is this alright? http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MY-290-CS&groupid=701&catid=8&subcat=1517

Or can you spec me better?

If it helps, my current mobo is:

Asrock ExtremE4 Gen3.

i5 2500k oc @ 4.6Ghz.

Thermaltake Silver Arrow CPU Cooler.

I've got the above RAM as well

One thing though, it would only run at stock speeds at 1.5v rather than 1.65v for me. Not complaining at all, but it's specced at 1.65v so was a big confusing when it failed Prime when using the XMP profile settings.

I went for 16GB for the same reasons as Surveyor - it'd be rude not to!

16GB is also nice for when something decides to leak, you don't even notice

Surveyor · 13 Feb 2012 at 00:04

Craig321 said:
One thing though, it would only run at stock speeds at 1.5v rather than 1.65v for me. Not complaining at all, but it's specced at 1.65v so was a big confusing when it failed Prime when using the XMP profile settings.

1.50V is much better for Sandy Bridge and is the recommended voltage.

1.575V is the maximum recommended by Intel.

OcUK have indicated this can be pushed to an absolute maximum of 1.60V.

I've found that letting RAM default to 1.65V can cause problems even though the RAM is tested at that, the memory controller on some CPU's just doesn't like it.

It's much safer to reduce the RAM voltage to as near to 1.50V as you can get it without causing instability.

One way or another you've done the absolute right thing

Craig321 · 13 Feb 2012 at 00:06

Surveyor said:
1.50V is much better for Sandy Bridge and is the recommended voltage.

1.575V is the maximum recommended by Intel.

OcUK have indicated this can be pushed to an absolute maximum of 1.60V.

I've found that letting RAM default to 1.65V can cause problems even though the RAM is tested at that, the memory controller on some CPU's just doesn't like it.

It's much safer to reduce the RAM voltage to as near to 1.50V as you can get it without causing instability.

I'm surprised that Corsair put an XMP profile on there that doesn't work/isn't recommended for Sandy Bridge builds :confused:

All running perfectly at 1.5v now though, has been for 10 months now - can't believe I've had it for 10 months already!

Surveyor · 13 Feb 2012 at 00:10

Craig321 said:
I'm surprised that Corsair put an XMP profile on there that doesn't work/isn't recommended for Sandy Bridge builds

Hence my signature, while it lasts.

Craig321 said:
All running perfectly at 1.5v now though, has been for 10 months now - can't believe I've had it for 10 months already!

That's how it should be.

1.5V is the healthy option.

a03dugga · 20 Feb 2012 at 19:41

Hey Surveyor, ive had my ram insatlled and have been using it for a few days now, using the xmp profile and manually set voltage to 1.5v.
I have been experiencing freezing, my ystem completely freezes, no bsod or anything, i have also upped the voltage a few times and still experience the freezing issue.