RAM for C2D rig

manveruppd · 5 Aug 2007 at 14:09

I'm between the following:
Crucial Ballistix PC5300
G.Skill NQ PC6400
OCZ Platinum edition XTC Revision 2 PC6400
OCZ Gold XTC Special Ops edition PC6400 (OCZ250E8002GK)

The important question: do any of these sticks have compatibility issues with any particular motherboards? I haven't decided which board I'm getting yet, but it'll probably be a P35 chipset.
Also, I know that the Ballistix are probably the best clockers among that lot, but I also know that they're a bit unreliable and I don't fancy having to fork out postage to send them back to Crucial for an RMA. The thing is, however, I know the D9 Micron chips are widely used, so I wanted to ask: which of these other sticks are NOT based on the D9s? If they all are, then I might as well go for the Crucials since they have the best RMA service. To sum up: I've heard 'pros' about all these chips - I know the 'cons' for the Ballistix: do any of the other chips also have any 'cons' I should know about?

Cupra · 5 Aug 2007 at 15:12

go for the ballistix there cheaper and wil clock as good as any if not better

manveruppd · 5 Aug 2007 at 15:28

They're all about the same price, from £62-69. And yes they'll clock better, but I only want high-FSB RAM to cover me for future upgrade: the chip that's going in that rig to start with is an E2140, for which even generic DDR2-800 at stock will be a 100% overclock!!

So why should I take the risk of having to send it back and forth for RMAs all the time?

Does anyone know whether any of the other sticks I mentioned are also based on the D9 chips? Or if there's anything else wrong with them?

manveruppd · 5 Aug 2007 at 20:27

Hmm... According to this thread over at xtremesystems the OCZ Platinum Ed Rev 2 also uses D9s. G.Skill RAM is also mentioned in that thread, but not the specific model I was looking at, and they don't offer any confirmation as to whehter or not they also use Micron chips on them.

According to THIS site on the other hand, the specific G.skills I was looking at mostly use Elpida and Samsung chips, which are reportedly less overclockable but also less prone to dying... However, I read a post on these forums (search still down so can't find it atm) which claimed to have overclocked the G.Skill NQs to over 900MHz, which is more than enough for my moderate bandwidth needs!! So there's not much to choose between them in terms of speed, the only issue is reliability and warranty service.

It seems to be an alternative of "get RAM with a high failure rate but very good RMA service" or "get RAM with a lower failure rate but unknown and possibly unreliable or slow RMA service"! :confused:

How's a guy supposed to make a choice out of these? It's like get something which you know is going to die but you won't have trouble replacing or get something which is less likely to die but you'll have trouble replacing! Do I chicken out and go for the Ballistix hoping I'll get a pair of good sticks, or take the gamble that the G.skills won't ever need RMAing at all? :confused:

DavidB · 5 Aug 2007 at 20:34

Maybe get the crucial ram and underclock it ?
Changing the voltage down and increaseing the timings might make it ultra stable whilst still having great RMA ? Im just stabbing in the dark here now lol

manveruppd · 5 Aug 2007 at 20:41

I've read plenty of posts from people both on here and xtremesystems that say their Ballistix died even at stock volts... I don't really see this as a major issue, since they have lifetime warranties, but if I have to send them back 3-4 times like one member on here that's potentially a lot of money in postage, and also another outlay in a spare stick of DDR2 so I'm not completely without a PC while waiting for the RMA!