different ram speeds

[sflyer]

I have done alot of reading lately and am going to build my first computer in a couple of weeks. The plan is so far is the following

Motherboard: Asus P4C800-E DELUXE

Processor: Intel Pentium 3.4gh

Now my question is which speed of ram should I get. Money isn't really the issue but speed and quality is. I see on the motherboard specs according to newegg.com, that the motherboard supports DDR400/333/266. I have seen also on newegg.com, ram that has speed such as DDR550/533/500. Would buying this faster ram be faster on this motherboard? Would it work at all? Would it only be faster if the board is overclocked? Would it only be faster if the board is upgraded in the future? I can't seem to figure this out from reading the forums. Thanks for any help.

sflyer

 

[TheSickness]

The best thing to do is get Ram that has the same clock speed as the CPU

This will give you better performance than, say, if you get a CPU with a Clock speed of 400 and you get Ram with a clock speed of 333

Hope this helps

 

[sflyer]

That makes sense, but would there be any advantage to getting ram with a faster clock speed. What processor would these faster ddr rams be used for?

sflyer

 

[David Lindon]

The faster speeds won't work. Do as 'TheSickness' says.

 

[TheSickness]

That makes sense, but would there be any advantage to getting ram with a faster clock speed. What processor would these faster ddr rams be used for?

sflyer

I dont know if you would get a increased performance, probably not.

But i dont think you would get a decrease either.

If you dont get a decrease, it might be worth getting Ram with a higher clock speed as if you would upgrade your cpu to one with a higher clock speed, you wopuld then get a performance increase

The CPU's they are used for are the one's with clock speeds higher than the normal cpus (P4 EE for example has a clock speed of 800 Mhz)

 

[sflyer]

So what your saying is that because I have a 3.4 Pentium 4 that has a FSB of 800 these faster rams will work to their full potential? That dosn't seem right to me for some reason.

 

[TheSickness]

So what your saying is that because I have a 3.4 Pentium 4 that has a FSB of 800 these faster rams will work to their full potential? That dosn't seem right to me for some reason.

That only works if the Clock speed of the ram matches that of the CPU.

If you've got Ram with a clock speed of 550, then it would work at its full potential with a CPU with a clock speed of 550 and so on

 

[Lord Kalthorn]

Yeah, with 800Mhz FSB you can probably get almost all forms of RAM and the higher the better to future proof it, as thesickness said to greatly help if you want to upgrade later.

 

[TheSickness]

Also, and i know this might sound obvious, but if you plan to keep the ram you already have, and put another stick inthere, either get a stick that has the same Clock speed or just get rid of the old one and get 2 of the same

I know its obvious but i've know a few people that haven't followed this and have had a great performance decrease

 

[Lord Kalthorn]

Yeah, RAM will stay at the lowest speed to make it work. It doesn't really matter with the old 100 and 133 models but when you've got up to 800Mhz in there and RAM dispositions of 400 until the next model it gets really noticable.