only a 16pt difference on 3d mark 03??!

alexuslakes · 2 Jan 2007 at 14:15

hey, i've recently upgraded my laptop from 512mb ram (2x256) to a 1gb stick. its an asus a6k turion 64 (1.6). I used the dedicated ram selector for my system on their website and it offered up this one:

Crucial Part Number: CT588930
Module Size: 1GB
Package: 200-pin SODIMM
Feature: DDR PC3200
Configuration: 128Meg x 64
DIMM Type: UNBUFFERED
Error Checking: NON-ECC
Speed: 400
SDRAM Timings: CL=3
Specs: DDR PC3200 • CL=3 • UNBUFFERED • NON-ECC • DDR400 • 2.5V • 128Meg x 64

my old ram is 2 sticks of 256mb pc 2700, ddr 333 CL 2.5 however, it said on the website that it is backward compatible and would be fine.

the 3d mark 03 score before changing the ram was 2500. the score after the upgrade was 2516? how can this be right?

i've also noticed that the system seems a little jumpier than it did before, for instance, on splinter cell chaos theory it used to run perfectly smoothly on the highest resolution and 8x antistropy but now it seems to miss a frame every so often... very odd and annoying. it is also slower at scrolling down very demading web pages (using the touchpad scroll) and it is even sluggish on itunes now!

Could it be that the pc2700 version of the 1 gb stick would be faster for my system? if so why have crucial sold me this one? because i used the memory comfiguration tool on their site i can send it back for free and get the other one but i wanted to hear from you folks first. many thanks.

steve258 · 2 Jan 2007 at 15:41

Not sure about the problems you're experiencing but adding RAM won't help gaming performance, which in your case is heavily limited by the graphics card. Extra Ram will improve game loading time and reduce stuttering in games.

benjo · 2 Jan 2007 at 15:45

steve258 said:
Not sure about the problems you're experiencing but adding RAM won't help gaming performance

Extra Ram will improve game loading time and reduce stuttering in games.

So it does or it doesn't? From experience, RAM has always helped gaming performance..

[TR]SweetSpotOz · 2 Jan 2007 at 15:46

steve258 · 2 Jan 2007 at 15:53

benjo said:
So it does or it doesn't? From experience, RAM has always helped gaming performance..

Extra RAM helps reducing loading time and stuttering.

Faster RAM will improve game performance in terms of frame rate increase but only when graphics card and CPU are not the limiting factors.

In this case his laptop has poor graphics so you can't expect a 1000 pts increase just by adding a gig of RAM is what I'm trying to say.

alexuslakes · 2 Jan 2007 at 16:40

hey thanks for the reply so far, ok so from the top-

Steve 258-”Not sure about the problems you're experiencing but adding RAM won't help gaming performance, which in your case is heavily limited by the graphics card. Extra Ram will improve game loading time and reduce stuttering in games.”

So you don’t think that reducing stuttering in games helps performance? One of the main things that has been happening is MORE stuttering. The main issue for me is that performance has actually taken a dip. And I wouldn’t say that my gfx card in my laptop is really poor , I know its only an nvidia 6200 go with 256mb ram but I can play most games on the highest settings so its not that bad surely? What I’m trying to say is that I would have expected more than just a 16 point difference in results; is it because that ram is not right for my laptop, or is that just the way it is? Is it worth exchanging for the pc 2700 CL 2.5 one?

Markyp23- “Is that DDR RAM?”

Yes it is but my laptop doesn’t support ddr so that’s a non factor I guess. I’m getting another gig in march but its nothing to do with ddr .

Does anyone think that the change from CL 2.5 to CL 3.0 would make a negative impact like the one I have described??

Thanks again

Foxor` · 2 Jan 2007 at 17:17

Your ram is DDR, otherwise how would a ddr400 stick fit and work? (duh) and to be honest with you a 6200"go" is really poor, esp for playing chaos theory

i wouldnt bother even trying to play games on your laptop,

The lower the timings eg. cl2.5 vs 3.0 generaly means faster performance..

The guy that said stuttering, means (i think) when the system runs out of RAM it writes/reads to the HDD which is a lot slower then RAM, so more ram means less writes/reads to the hdd which *would* effect the overall performance of the game,

On getting the PC2700 ram, why dont you run the ram u have @ tighter timings, eg, 2-2-2 see if that works, it should be fine if its running at ddr333 and not its rated speed.

You could try overclocking your 6200, google coolbits to unlock the OC tab for ** drivers.(im not sure if it works with laptop versions of cards) Making sure the settings are correct in the laptop's bios, it may have reset to default settings eg ddr266 which would be slower the ddr333/400

Have you installed anything else onto the system? try defraging, not much else to suggest

Foxor-

Edit:
by the way, im pretty sure you *CANT* play games on the highest settings with that.... do you games look like this? and run @ 60+ fps all the time?

www.geocities.com/ellukeo/Titanquest.bmp

Foxor-

alexuslakes · 2 Jan 2007 at 18:50

Foxor` said:
Your ram is DDR, otherwise how would a ddr400 stick fit and work? (duh) and to be honest with you a 6200"go" is really poor, esp for playing chaos theory i wouldnt bother even trying to play games on your laptop,
Foxor-

Erm ok 'foxor' hows about next time before you jump in with a load of useless rubbish you actually read what someone has written... i stated that MY LAPTOP does not support ddr (duh), of course the ram is ddr, it says it in my post (yet again... duh) you really are more stupid/incompetent/weak than your name suggests... (if that is possible)

and for gods sake, don’t start with the whole 'mine is better than yours' routine, its very boring... much like you I would imagine.

owned.

Foxor` · 2 Jan 2007 at 18:58

alexuslakes said:
Erm ok 'foxor' hows about next time before you jump in with a load of useless rubbish you actually read what someone has written... i stated that MY LAPTOP does not support ddr (duh), of course the ram is ddr, it says it in my post (yet again... duh) you really are more stupid/incompetent/weak than your name suggests... (if that is possible)

and for gods sake, don’t start with the whole 'mine is better than yours' routine, its very boring... much like you I would imagine.

owned.

OK "MATE" ddr is 240pin (200pin for laptops) sdr is 168pin so if your mobo doesnt support DDR how did it fit into you ram slots????

nightic · 2 Jan 2007 at 18:58

alexuslakes said:
Markyp23- “Is that DDR RAM?”

Yes it is but my laptop doesn’t support ddr so that’s a non factor I guess. I’m getting another gig in march but its nothing to do with ddr.

OK - That line makes no sense. What exactly do you think "DDR" is?

alexuslakes said:
Does anyone think that the change from CL 2.5 to CL 3.0 would make a negative impact like the one I have described??

A negative impact - yes.
An obviously noticeable one as you've described - not so sure.

Foxor` · 2 Jan 2007 at 19:10

alexuslakes said:
Erm ok 'foxor' hows about next time before you jump in with a load of useless rubbish you actually read what someone has written... i stated that MY LAPTOP does not support ddr (duh), of course the ram is ddr, it says it in my post (yet again... duh) you really are more stupid/incompetent/weak than your name suggests... (if that is possible)

and for gods sake, don’t start with the whole 'mine is better than yours' routine, its very boring... much like you I would imagine.

owned.

#1 Infact your the one thats owned, how can you put DDR ram into SDR ram slots? its impossible (unless you like watching you ram die), so infact your owned because your motherboard does support DDR, or how would you be able to put DDR Ram into it?

#2 you said you could play games at max and your gfx card wasnt the cause of the slow fps, infact it cant and its **** i wouldnt pay one pound for a 6200go. i was just proving that in a nice way now im just being a ****.

#3 All Athlon chips after the XP's (some xp's (1.4ghz) had ddr support) had DDR support. Turions use DDR ram, someone correct me if im wrong....

rofl... i cant stop laughing at this statement

"i stated that MY LAPTOP does not support ddr (duh), of course the ram is ddr,"

hahaha haha rofl.

Foxor-

Minstadave · 2 Jan 2007 at 19:13

Your RAM is DDR and your laptop supports DDR RAM.

It does not support Dual Channel Memory, which is not DDR, they are seperate.

alexuslakes · 3 Jan 2007 at 18:36

Minstadave said:
Your RAM is DDR and your laptop supports DDR RAM.

It does not support Dual Channel Memory, which is not DDR, they are seperate.

ha ha i was obviously not concentrating when i wrote that! ha, rather amusing.

appologies to all.

oh on a serious note, i've been looking on 3d mark and it states that the frequency of my ram is 400mhz- does that mean it is running at 400 or that it is rated at 400? how can i find out anyone? thanks.

steve258 · 3 Jan 2007 at 18:41

Best way to find out is to download the CPU-Z 1.38 it will tell you everything you need to know about your CPU, motherboard and RAM.

http://www.cpuid.com/cpuz.php

alexuslakes · 3 Jan 2007 at 22:22

steve258 said:
Best way to find out is to download the CPU-Z 1.38 it will tell you everything you need to know about your CPU, motherboard and RAM.

http://www.cpuid.com/cpuz.php

thanks steve, i've just used cpuz and it came up with the expected results...

on the memory tab it states that the frequency is running at 200.9 mhz. does that equate to 400mhz (ddr)? surely i need it to be running at 333? do i need to change it and if so how? many thanks.

Minstadave · 3 Jan 2007 at 22:41

alexuslakes said:
thanks steve, i've just used cpuz and it came up with the expected results...

on the memory tab it states that the frequency is running at 200.9 mhz. does that equate to 400mhz (ddr)? surely i need it to be running at 333? do i need to change it and if so how? many thanks.

If its running stable at 400Mhz then leave it as it is, its faster

Zefan · 3 Jan 2007 at 22:42

Don double post!

Nice ninja edit

steve258 · 3 Jan 2007 at 22:55

Yes that is DDR400 speed.

I'd thought thought it's automatically clocked at 333Mhz to match the FSB speed.

It is usually not possible to change the mem speed outside BIOS, however these settings are almost always absent in laptop bioses.

You can try A64 tweaker 0.60 Beta:

http://files.extremeoverclocking.com/file.php?f=106

and change the MEMCLK Frequency setting to 166 then press "set".

However I have never used this before on a laptop so not sure if it works on laptop A64s, so do this at your own risk.

Does the 6200 Go on your laptop have independent memory or is it shared with the main memory as a lot of laptops do??

alexuslakes · 4 Jan 2007 at 15:37

steve258 said:
Yes that is DDR400 speed.

I'd thought thought it's automatically clocked at 333Mhz to match the FSB speed.

It is usually not possible to change the mem speed outside BIOS, however these settings are almost always absent in laptop bioses.

You can try A64 tweaker 0.60 Beta:

http://files.extremeoverclocking.com/file.php?f=106

and change the MEMCLK Frequency setting to 166 then press "set".

However I have never used this before on a laptop so not sure if it works on laptop A64s, so do this at your own risk.

Does the 6200 Go on your laptop have independent memory or is it shared with the main memory as a lot of laptops do??

well it is running stable so i guess i'll leave it. maybe i could tinker with the timings for a little extra speed?? i've never done this before but would like to so any advice would be good.

The 6200go has its own memory, i've recently used rivatuner on it and have increased both core and mem speed by 30mhz each. this has changed the 3d mark03 score from 2516 to 2697, not bad. how far do you think i could take it?

also, on cpuz (and on nb probe) it states that this card is pcie running at 8x. firstly, i didnt think it was pcie and secondly why is it running at 8x (it says 16x availiable next to it). confused????

Mole · 4 Jan 2007 at 18:03

Hi,

I've never found that running memory out of sync with the FSB to be a particularly great thing to do. Since your old memory is PC2700 what happens if you add back in one of the 256MB sticks? This should force the system to run the whole lot in sync with the FSB and at least let you see if PC2700 RAM would be better (i.e. less stutters and smoother system performance).

You can use CPU-Z again to see if adding an old stick back in has changed the RAM speed.

Given it is running single channel mode anyway (from what I can tell from the AMD website) I doubt you can lose performance - you might even want to leave it this way and run 1.25GB!

Hope this helps,

Martin