OC3D Article: 3GB, GB & 12GB DDR3 Investigated

[w3bbo]

With the advent of a triple channel memory controller on Intel's latest CPU, enthusiasts have been forced to ask a new question: Which memory configuration is best?

Read the full article here.

 

[monkey7]

Lol at the photos with all the ram. And 200 quid for 12GB, I paid that for 6GB 1333MHz. Prices are really dropping now.

Nice and unique review, really sheds some light on questions which are asked a lot and answered rarely.

 

[themcman1]

That was a really good review - I really enjoyed reading that.

I want to have enough RAM to take photos like that though.

 

[Rastalovich]

Outstanding article.

The large leap in the price from 6g to 12g as opposed to the leap from 3g to 6g really pushes the business requirements for the largest kit. The CS4 results show they'll get reward for it professionally in terms of time over work hours. Even tho 6g will do a great job, 12g plus the cost, minus perhaps the vat and time saved would make it viable.

(*cough* most of ours still use 2g in the main, with 4g if they're lucky - don't know of any 8g machines - 775 ofc) If the heads of the departments concerned really had their heads around the figures, they'd be more concerned with maxing the memory of their pcs rather than paying over the odds for a retailed pc with an nvidiafx card that will relatively not help them as much. Go figure.

From what I can see as far as the gamer is concerned, 3g is no issue, particularly for those who fps the majority of the time. I'd perhaps throw in an argument of certain games utilizing more memory over others. 6g for £95 or so in the present climate is surprizingly cheap, meaning I expected it to cost a whole lot more.

I think it will get to a stage where 6g is so cheap that considering u've spent 100s on ur mobo and cpu, a matter of 10s of pounds between 3 and 6 would make it a non-issue and covers more bases.

I'm glad u did an OS reinstall between memory switches, there would have been many complications otherwize.

Great stuff.

 

[w3bbo]

Cheers for the comments guys.

This was perhaps the biggest, most time consuming article/review I have done thus far. As we have not done a test on this magnetude to date, a lot of experimentation was used to find the optimum testing procedures, image and video sizes etc because, as you say Rast, without a re-install, there were anomolies and strange results that didn't match what I was expecting. Not only that but passing filters over a 4gb image with 3GB of ram ground the system to a halt whereas 12 GB found it a breeze, if somewhat time consuming.

I used each kit for a week's worth of 'everyday' computing. 12GB is definately worth it if you are working with large files and although most of the benchmarks don't significantly back this up, simply opening and closing programs, general vista use etc made the expereince so 'slick'.

 

[Rastalovich]

If u still have the 12g in-house, it'd be interesting if u could create a ram disk and run a game off it. Dunno how u'd do that with Vista.

 

[PeterStoba]

One of the most informative articles i've read in a long time, it seems 6GB is what I should choose ;0

 

[AntiHeroUK]

A very well thought out and in depth review. Looks like the 6GB is the best bet for anyone going down the i7 route and the way prices are currently it would be silly not to.

Keep up the good work w3bbo

 

[n0nsense]

Nice

Although it is nice to see such review, i think you miss some point.

As far as i know, there is very little to no difference between single dual and triple channel mode. So even if you do own i7, you can still live with normal dual channel kits. this will give you some flexibility with amount of memory.

The second point is that as you shown, there are few applications that can utilise (benefit) from large RAM. I can think only about large projects in CAD applications in addition to Photoshop. But if we put benchmarking aside and come to real life world, my guess is that i'm not the only person that does not like to restart computer. Smaller number even take one step further and do not close applications since they probably will want to use them again before restarting the system.

In this scenario you can end with slow and unresponsive system if you don't have enough RAM.

I have only one computer with MS OS and it is Win 7 64 bit with 3 GB of ram.

2x1GB + 2x512MB. It is used as my personal desktop at work. The most Used applications are Browsers and Office suits. If i open 1 tab and one document it is not a problem. But usually after few days after restart i endup with 20+ tabs + 2-4 Text documents , 1-2 presentations and 2-5 spreadsheets. Of course there is antivirus , music player, VMware infrastructure client, Visual Studio, Source and bug control software and others.

Each one can run fine on 2,1 or even 0.5 GB setup. But put them all together and i find myself looking what can be closed in order to make system more responsive. RAM usage is usually above 85%.

Rest of my computers are Linux based and can't be directly compared to MS since memory management is different and OS memory footprint is significantly lower. (less then 100MB with at least 600MB for vista and 7).

So the benefit from large RAM depends on usage pastern.

Another aspect is RAM disk which is very nice, but i cant see how it can be implemented with 10+GB vista and 7 installation. So it's more for NIX users.

To summarise, for most of us it is nice/must to have 4-6 GB for comfortable usage. Those with special needs like CAD or Photoshop processing large files should get as much as possible.

 

[w3bbo]

Although it is nice to see such review, i think you miss some point.

As far as i know, there is very little to no difference between single dual and triple channel mode.

Sorry m8, no offence but I stopped reading at that point

 

[n0nsense]

Not really offenced

Sorry m8, no offence but I stopped reading at that point

You right ...

You should start here

tomshardware.com/reviews/PARALLEL-PROCESSING,1705-11.html

and then read here

insidehw.com/Reviews/Memory/Intel-Core-i7-Dual-Channel-vs.-Triple-Channel-Memory-Mode.html

and then you should do some homework/testing like i did.

and then you can try to offence

P.S.

sorry for the ugly links, i'm not allowed to to post them yet

 

[Sihastru]

<joke>

As far as i know, there is very little to no difference between single dual and triple channel mode.

I must disagree... contrary to (un)popular belief multi channel tech is not another marketing gimmick. Oh, foolish me... putting those 640GB AAKS drives in a RAID0 config... oh, foolish me... buying that 8GB Mushkin kit... I did it for the color of their heat spreaders... you see they were "arctic frostbite"...

Point #1: You can NEVER have TOO MUCH ram! If you don't see it now, you'll see it in about six months.

Point #2: You can NEVER have TOO MANY channels! If you didn't see it by now, you'll never get the chance to. They don't build them like that anymore. (or you could try an Atom and unleash pain upon yourself)

Point #3: Never leave open memory slots on any motherboard you buy. It's not esthetically appealing. If you don't have any more sticks of RAM around, use xeroxed paper clippings.

</joke>

 

[PeterStoba]

I don't know why everybody is being sarcastic, I see exactly what he means, I've read those reviews a while back, and it does seem to be true, so no need for the "flaming"

 

[n0nsense]

correction

thanks dude,

imho it is not sarcasm. it is arrogance.

They live in small wintel (M$+x86) world and know little to nil beyond the PR of these two or three corporations.

My point was to help. If they prefer to stick with stigmas and spend money unnecessary hw, i don't mind as long as it does not come from my taxes.

 

[w3bbo]

...and my point was I was reviewing the differences between 3, 6 and 12GB. All of which use tri-channel, not single or dual as that was not the aim of the review so you point was moot, hence I finished reading your post there.

I was not questioning single, dual or tri channel. Those who choose to use dual channel kits from previous memory generation could well burn out the MC on the i7 as the DDR3 dual channel kits most often require more than the 1.65v Intel recommends. As a respectable review site we would not recommend doing such things.

 

[Rastalovich]

As a side point, there are bunches of software out there, from companies that will remain nameless, that fall over if ur system has more memory than the dumbass "programmers" planned for.

Most googleable will be driversets. There are versions of very popular OSes that will fall over also.

U have to do something silly like install it/them with 2g, then put ur memory in afterwards.

 

[w3bbo]

Like vista 64bit then pre sp1 lol.

 

[FarFarAway]

The point of the article was a debate for those buying triple RAM kits on i7, nothing to do with dual vs triple channel.

Toms = not a reliable source imo, but that's personal preference.

The review is useful in that it bottoms out whether spending a little more on a 6GB kit is worth it - and even whether you should extend that further to 12gb.

n0nsense - whilst your points may have some validity for yourself, we cannot possibly figure out every usage situation for every reader and as such I believe that taking the approach of an intensive user is the best scenario for a review. Mounting up usage over days of use is all very well, but reviewers only have a certain amount of time with hardware and certainly not enough time to do as you suggest AND complete an actual review with pertinent benchmarks etc before the deadline (which w3bbo always makes, I may add). Refining this review has taken a long time I may add and a lot of hard work.

Great review Rich

 

[n0nsense]

Kempez - I did't say you should do such things. You can't even if you want to. I suggested to mention such situation to give adequate point of view in which 3 GB is almost not an option.

My guess that you are experienced enough to know such things.

w3bbo - you at least should read whole thing before responding. But i'm not your father to care about your maners. As long as you do the reviews based on facts/numbers, i don't really care about your personal opinion

 

[sprento]

But i'm not your father to care about your maners.

LOL, taking this a wee bit to personal don't ya think !