Four SR Sticks vs two DR sticks

SpudMaster

SpudMaster

SpudMaster

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I know the performance gains which seem to have been brought to the light of the masses recently with four SR RAM stick and two DR RAM sticks. My question is would two DR rank sticks clock easier than four SR sticks or are two sticks only easier to clock as they put less strain on the IMC when they are SR?
 
Theoretically, having two ranks per stick should clock better. (Just 2 dual rank sticks should work better than 4 single rank sticks.)
 
I ran 4 sticks for a while but was ultimately able to get 2 sticks stable at higher speeds and tighten the timings down to where two SR sticks were slightly better than 4 SR sticks.

In my case though, it was two 16gb kits. The part numbers were identical, but they weren't sold as a complete kit of 4 and that may have held back my attempts at 4-stick overclocking.

A complete 4-stick kit will probably overclock better than my two-pair attempt.
 
bremen1874 said:
No obvious reason why they would.
Click to expand...

I would hope all sticks in a given kit are tested to work together on an average motherboard.

With my two 16gb kits, I have two sticks that are validated to work with each other, and two other sticks that have not been tested with the first pair.
 
So two options here...

1. They grab sticks off the production line that individually pass the base requirements and bundle them together in twos or fours as required.
2. They take sticks off the line and carefully test them in sets to ensure they work perfectly together.

If you think 2. is correct I've got a bridge you might be interested in.
 
bremen1874 said:
So two options here...

1. They grab sticks off the production line that individually pass the base requirements and bundle them together in twos or fours as required.
2. They take sticks off the line and carefully test them in sets to ensure they work perfectly together.

If you think 2. is correct I've got a bridge you might be interested in.
Click to expand...

I like how the sticks are "grabbed" off the line with "base requirements" in option one and "carefully" tested to function "perfectly" in option two.

Two sticks working together is a "base requirement" for a two stick kit.

Four sticks working together is a "base requirement" for a four stick kit.

I doubt the level of required "perfection" is different between the kits.

Kits are kits. They need to work as sold.
 
But why would they need to do anything extra to create a four stick kit rather than a two stick kit?

All of the sticks need to meet the advertised speeds for the memory as sold. Grab two or four at random and you've got a working kit. No need for any special two stick/four stick testing.

They obviously only need to work at the advertised speed. You seem to be suggesting that buying a quad pack will magically guarantee you four faster sticks and better performance.

It's luck of the draw, and you're limited to what the worst stick can handle. That's true whether you buy them as a set of four or two sets of two.
 
Also interested in where you go with this - I have 2x 8GB 3200 C15 sticks in mine (single rank), and was considering grabbing another 2x 8GB of identical ram (Corsair Vengence RGB 3000 @ 3200 / C15).

Turns out, its £110 to get 2x of those sticks - and only £150 to buy 2x 16gb 3600 / C18 Ram (Corsair Vengence RGB Pro - I read these are DualRank).... almost seems easier and better to just replace the 3000 with 3600 and resell the old stuff.
 
Slightly unrelated but i was quite surprised with going from 2 sticks 16gb to 4 sticks 32gb. Was testing in watch dogs and my minimums jump by 10fps! Makes the game much more playable compared to before.
 
Jay85 said:
Slightly unrelated but i was quite surprised with going from 2 sticks 16gb to 4 sticks 32gb. Was testing in watch dogs and my minimums jump by 10fps! Makes the game much more playable compared to before.
Click to expand...
I wasnt that bothered previously with my 2600 I have currently, but with a view to moving to a 5600 in Jan (if they are available and if MSI releases b450 bioses) - I figure I may as well get the ram now and benifit untill that point.
 
slunge said:
I wasnt that bothered previously with my 2600 I have currently, but with a view to moving to a 5600 in Jan (if they are available and if MSI releases b450 bioses) - I figure I may as well get the ram now and benifit untill that point.
Click to expand...
Yeah tbh despite what people say, you can never have too much ram :rolleyes:.

You'd probs benefit even more from higher speed ram to match your cpu's infinity fabric.
 
Perhaps, but realistically it seems that infinity fabric is only really stable up to 1800 (maybe 1900 at a push) - so while could start buying 4000 ram, starts to get very expensive very quick with somewhat diminishing returns I feel, the 3600 stuff at the moment appears to hit price/performance sweet spot.
 
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