Wich RAM should I go for?

[sniperchang]

Hey guys,

I'm building a system for a friend. see thread here. He wants 4 gigs of ram, so what do you think would be better?

Corsair TWIN2X4096-6400C5 (2x2gb) @ around $320 (5-5-5-18)
2x Corsair XMS2 2GB (2X1GB) PC6400 @ around $260 (4-4-4-12)

Now, with the two 2gb ram, dual-channel will be quite effective, but it has higher timings. Four 1gb ram has tighter timings and will also dual-channel, but there's four too put in and therefore slightly slow down overall performance (due to physical limitations). So what would be best? Any other suggestions?

thanks!

 

[2048Megabytes]

What is your friend going to use his computer for? Gaming?

 

[sniperchang]

What is your friend going to use his computer for? Gaming?

Yup, lots and lots of gaming.

 

[2048Megabytes]

I would recommend going with the below OCZ memory:

OCZ Flex XLC 2 gigabyte (2 x 1 gigabyte) 240-Pin PC2-6400 Dual Channel Kit Desktop $121

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227190

 

[sniperchang]

I would recommend going with the below OCZ memory:

OCZ Flex XLC 2 gigabyte (2 x 1 gigabyte) 240-Pin PC2-6400 Dual Channel Kit Desktop $121

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227190

ok I'll take that into consideration. But what about using two stick of 2gigs as opposed to four stick of 1gig?

 

[MixedLogik]

I've heard some really good things about this Ram.

CORSAIR XMS2 4GB(4 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Quad Kit Desktop Memory - Retail
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820145178

 

[2048Megabytes]

You are unlikely to see much better performance with 4 gigabytes of memory versus two gigabytes. I would probably go with four gigabytes of memory so you will not have to buy more memory in the future.

Most current programs cannot utilize more than 3 gigabytes of memory as most software is built for a 32-bit operating system. But, in the future, when 64 bit software is available, the 4 gigabytes of memory will do some good.