Dual channel

ConTRo13R · 5 Dec 2008 at 17:53

Mate of mine motherboard has recently had slots 2 and 3 stop working, i suggested getting it RMA'd but he doesn't want the hassle of being without a computer.

What is the performance benefit of having 2GB in dual channel over and above it them being in slots 0 and 1?

There has to be quite some doesn't there?

pastymuncher · 5 Dec 2008 at 19:24

I know for a fact that the difference between single channel on socket 754 and dual channel on socket 939 was minimal. There was a very small difference in performance when i made the change. Not sure about DDR2 though.

helmutcheese · 5 Dec 2008 at 19:44

Hmm, the difference is near 100% now, on Socket A AMD's when it was 1st brought out it was about 12% difference.

Just that AMD64's have far better Memory Bandwidth than all Intels (not sure on new I7 with internal Memory Controller but these look crap so far).

Mattus · 5 Dec 2008 at 20:45

ConTRo13R said:
What is the performance benefit of having 2GB in dual channel over and above it them being in slots 0 and 1?

It depends what type of CPU it is. Some (e.g. Pentium 4) really benefit from the extra bandwidth, but with some other CPUs (e.g. AMD64) it makes little difference.

ConTRo13R · 5 Dec 2008 at 20:46

core 2 duo is the cpu type he using

Mattus · 5 Dec 2008 at 20:49

Probably won't make much difference then. C2D isn't a very bandwidth-dependent architecture (based on Pentium M, which was designed with single-channel memory in mind). Plus, if it's at stock, the memory might well be running faster than the system FSB, which means it matters even less.

ConTRo13R · 5 Dec 2008 at 20:51

Ok brilliant no need for an RMA then lol he doesnt Oc and only has 32bit XP lol

Cheers guys.

Beside Asus take forever with RMA's