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RAM

Started by Russell Apr 21, 2003 at 8:41 PM 1 replies 250+ views

Original Post

Apr 21, 2003 at 8:41 PM

I''m considering building a new computer and I''m debating which kind of RAM to get. The data rate seems to be what most people use to determine which RAM is better (RDRAM > DDRAM > SDRAM), but I have heard some people say that SDRAM gave them better performance when they used programs that made use of memory a lot. This is due to the memory access latency I believe, where SDRAM has the lowest latency, and RDRAM has the highest. The person I heard this from was the author of a chess program. In any good chess program, they use a huge hash table to cache the results of previous searches. Most hash tables are from 64MB-256MB. I''m a little confused, because it seems like if you are reading data from memory at 4x the speed (RDRAM vs. SDRAM), the latency would have to be greater than 4x for the SDRAM to be faster. The only CPU intensive stuff I do is, I write and run chess programs as a hobby, and I play online games. I don''t know a whole lot about which RAM to get. Please advise.

jdhardy

Apr 21, 2003 at 10:59 PM

For AMD, DDR is the only option.

For Intel, you can go with Rambus, which isn''t much more expensive than DDR anymore, but is on the way out, or DDR.

If memory performance is important, make sure you get a dual-channel system like the Intel i875P or the nVidia nForce 2 (those are the chipsets, not the motherboards. You''ll have to figure out which boards use the chipsets). I''m assuming you have money to burn, of course

.

The i875Ps are brand-new and not quite on the market yet, but should be soon (and for P4 only). The nForce2 is for AMD processors only. Also, for dual-channel systems, you need two identital RAM sticks, adding to the cost. If an i875P is too much, the i865 should suffice (you just lose the dual-channel memory) but they are not out yet either.

There are plenty of boards that support just regular single-channel DDR for both AMD and Intel platforms.

Search around THG or AnandTech to learn a little more.

Also, if you go with DDR and latency is important, make sure you get CL2 (CAS Latency 2) memory, as opposed to CL2.5 or CL3. DDR333 CL2 is usually faster than DDR400 CL2.5, but DDR400 CL2 on an i875P is fastest of all. ("DDR333" means DDR @ 333 MHz effective, 166 MHz real clock -- DDR trnsfers data twice per cycle, so marketing people like to double the number)

"The sun is the same in a relative way,
but you''re older"
--Pink Floyd

Drevay

Apr 21, 2003 at 11:05 PM

DDRAM, best bang for the buck, IMHO.

DigiCode - My solo company in progress.

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