Ideal Memory Speed

[The Duke]

Is there an ideal memory speed to coincide with Intel's Core 2 Duo processors. Some of the information I've been reading suggests that a memory speed of PC2-4200 is ideal for Core 2's, and that only when going to PC2-6400 is there any significant gain in performance.

Also, that PC2-5300 can decrease performance. If it is the case that in someone's experience PC2-5300 does decrease performance despite having the faster speed than PC2-4200, could someone explain why?

The information is coming from wikipedia which I've heard isn't always reliable, so I was wondering if anyone could shed some light on this.


Any help would be appreciated.


Thanks,

 

[apj101]

here is the key sentence from that article

While expensive DDR2 memory models with tighter timings do improve performance, the difference in real world games and applications is negligible.

the pc2-4200 hit the right performance-price points

 

[The Duke]

Thanks for the reply.

The place I plan on getting my computer sells Kingston PC2-4200 and PC2-5300 for about the same price (within 5 dollars) so the point about the increased performance not necessarily being worth the extra expense doesn't really apply.

The part that concerned me though was again the part of the article that said that PC2-5300 can decrease performance. What would the reason be for this if it has a faster memory speed?


Thanks,