Which 2GB Kit to go with my system?

Anders0n · 8 Mar 2006 at 10:00

Hi there,

Will be building myself a new system in the coming weeks and i cant seem to decide which 2GB kit to get. The system will comprise of...

EPoX EP-9NPA+ Ultra
AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 3800+
Samsung SpinPoint P SP2504C 250GB

I'll be using the system for every day tasks aswell as movie encoding and photoshop work so i think 2GB ram would be justified. Thing is, i dont know if i need a cheap kit or an expensive one? As far as overclocking goes i may try and push a little more out of the CPU but nothing else.

Any help would be appreciated,

Thanks

helpimcrap · 8 Mar 2006 at 12:56

from what i have seen you either buy a cheap kit like the geil value or a super expensive one to get really tight timings or up to around 270fsb.

i tend to only up the chip so i went geil but geil should hopefully be good for around 220 fsb from what ive read.

Squidge · 8 Mar 2006 at 13:07

All depends on how much you want to spend. Geil is good for about 220Mhz, and the Corsair 4000 stuff looks ok as well for the slight increase in price. If your only after a slight overclock, then the Geil is probably the best bet, but if want to go faster than about 220Mhz, then you'll have to use a divider, or get the slightly more expensive RAM.

Geil is about £130 for 2gb last time I looked. Corsair 4000 is only about £150. If you can afford the extra £20, I'd go for it, as it'll give you more overclocking headroom without the hassles of worrying if there's an appropriate divider, and possibly underclocking your ram.

Anders0n · 8 Mar 2006 at 13:54

Thanks for your reply's...

£152.69 - Corsair 2GB DDR XMS4000PT TwinX (2x1GB) CAS3 (MY-094-CS)
£105.69 - Corsair 2GB DDR Value Select PC3200 CAS3.0 Kit (2x1GB) (VS2GBKIT400C3) (MY-080-CS)
£117.44 - GeIL 2GB (2x1GB) PC3200 Value Dual Channel Kit CAS3 (GE2GB3200BDC) (MY-046-GL)
£152.69 - G.Skill 2GB DDR ZX PC3200 (2x1GB) CAS2 Dual Channel Kit (F1-3200PHU2-2GBZX) (MY-007-GS)
£152.69 - G.Skill 2GB DDR HZ PC4000 (2x1GB) CAS3 Dual Channel Kit (F1-4000USU2-2GBHZ) (MY-008-GS)
£105.69 - OcUK Value 2GB (2x1GB) PC3200 184pin DDR Memory Dual Channel Kit (MY-006-OK)

Im looking to go for the cheapest option possible and if i was to with the GeIL, i might aswell go with the Corsair or G.Skill stuff because im getting much better ram for only a few quid more...

The Corsair value select and the OcUK stuff seem to be the cheaper options, would i be able to OC the CPU at all with these? And would be general performance be different than the more expenisive options?

Thanks

Squidge · 8 Mar 2006 at 17:30

You'll still be able to overclock, you'll just more than likely need to use a divider, so your ram could be underclocked depending on the frequency you run the CPU at. All depends what dividers the motherboard has.

Anders0n · 9 Mar 2006 at 15:59

So would it be safe to go with either of the 2 £105 options? Aparently the Epox mobo is good for overclocking.

kimandsally · 10 Mar 2006 at 11:34

Well I have the G Skill HZ which does 280fsb @ 2.5v this is fully prime 95 stable for 16 + hours I'm currently trying at 283 I'm getting close to the edge on either the CPU or RAM but I've only has a CPU that could go this fast for 2 days.

Tuvoc · 11 Mar 2006 at 13:41

Xtorsion said:
So would it be safe to go with either of the 2 £105 options? Aparently the Epox mobo is good for overclocking.

I have the 2GB Corsair value kit. I'm running 256HTT with a 166/200 divider which runs it at 210, stoxck 8-3-3-3 timings. Memtest and prime95 stable. So yes, you can get a mild overclock by using 1:1, and a decent overclock using a divider. The RAM probably goes higher than 210 but definitely not over 220 I'd say.