1600 Mhz on AMD A-10 6800k

papercut03 · Jun 17, 2013

Hi I did some research and I found out that higher Mhz should be put with APU's so what is going to happen if i put 1600 MHz RAM? (btw im only going to put 4gb since I will only play league and dota2) will it have a drastic effect FPS wise? THANK YOU!

aredflyingbird · Jun 17, 2013

papercut03 :

Yes, APU's gpu tend to use your RAM. Ill recommend 8gb 1600. 4gb will probably limit your performance.

bigpinkdragon286 · Jun 17, 2013

Tom's did an article that covers your very question. Essentially, for an APU, 1600 MHz is about where you want to start for any sort of gaming performance, but as you increase the RAM bandwidth, you directly affect frames per second. Whether or not it's enough to justify the cost of faster RAM is up to you.

You can find the article here:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/memory-bandwidth-scaling-trinity,3419.html

Legohouse · Jun 17, 2013

Hello,

papercut03 :

The AMD-6800K is one of the first processor in AMD’s 2013 APU range to be released. Yes, 1600MHz is compatible with the processor. Make sure that the motherboard supports the speed to (of course it does, just saying) FPS wise maybe, but I do not believe so. But yeah there will be performance increase if you upgrade which might be an overall increase in speed not specifically related to your games. Maybe you could upto 8GB which is the right amount of memory to run any modern game. Getting a better GPU should also help. Hope that helps. Cheers!!

papercut03 · Jun 17, 2013

bigpinkdragon286 :

THANKS FOR THE ARTICLE! another question, what if I upgrade my RAM to 8GB but still 1600Mhz will I have an increase in FPS or its going to be the same?

bigpinkdragon286 · Jun 17, 2013

You will likely only increase your FPS if you upgrade the speed of the RAM, not if you upgrade the quantity of the RAM. The two games you have mentioned are not going to require vast amounts of memory to run full speed. You are going to be limited most by the RAM's bandwidth.

aredflyingbird · Jun 17, 2013

papercut03 :

You will have an increase of performance. You can also buy a 6670 and crossfire with that APU which will also increase performance.

Legohouse · Jun 17, 2013

papercut03 :

Yes, 8GB will come in handy as your APU is using integrated graphics but I do not think it will help the cause of the FPS. The lag you are experiencing or FPS is more or likely determined by the GPU. So adding a better GPU should help it.

photonboy · Jun 18, 2013

Adding a second GPU will introduce micro-stutter but it will increase frame rates. It's a bit of a Win-Lose situation.

Careful tweaking can also help if done properly. For example:
1. Install RADEONPRO
2. Drag over your game EXE file to setup a profile
3. TWEAK in RadeonPro to run at "HALF VSYNC" (30FPS)
4. Monitor the frame rate and tweak the quality settings in the game to achieve 30FPS at least 80 or 90% of the time.

This is just an example of how to VSYNC at 30FPS (avoid screen tearing) which is a good compromise for a system like this. Some people disable VSYNC to avoid the slight lag/sluggishness it introduces but personally I can't stand the screen tearing.

bigpinkdragon286 · Jun 18, 2013

All this talk of 8 GB giving him better performance is based on what? It will not give him better performance in at least one of the two games he's mentioned. League is a pretty old game, and not well written. It's also 32-bit so is not even capable of utilizing more than 2 GB of RAM. 4 GB of fast RAM would leverage better performance for an APU more than 8 GB of slower RAM.

papercut03 · Jun 18, 2013

bigpinkdragon286 :

yeah im only planning to play dota2, league, maple story and starcraft. so i will be good right?

bigpinkdragon286 · Jun 18, 2013

I assume you mean StarCraft II? That's probably the only one that might need the settings dialed in a bit further to run well, as it tends to be CPU bound, but otherwise, your system should run those games.

papercut03 · Jun 18, 2013

bigpinkdragon286 :

dya mean like it can max out the other 3 games but the SC2 is like on a shitty settings?

bigpinkdragon286 · Jun 18, 2013

No, I question whether it can max out anything except for League. APU's are not speed demons, they are good compromises.

photonboy · Jun 19, 2013

papercut03 :

Most games don't benefit from more than 1600MHz for speed or 4GB for TOTAL in your system (no need for 8GB if the budget can't support it). While 1866MHz get "better" performance than 1600MHz in the Sandra test in reality you would see absolutely NO DIFFERENCE in gaming as your CPU isn't fast enough to require that access speed with the memory.

The best value for you is a reliable 1600MHz, 2x2GB kit.

G. Skill makes reliably memory: http://us.ncix.com/products/?sku=57952&vpn=F3%2D12800CL9D%2D4GBXL&manufacture=G%2ESkill

I was surprised to see games benefitting from 1866MHz and higher in the article linked above though. Anyway, don't forget to TWEAK the quality settings of your games so that you don't suffer low frame rates. SC2 on your system would be best run at 30FPS.

You may wish to download RadeonPro, then setup SC2 using the "HALF VSYNC" method and tweak the settings to achieve 30FPS (when you get larger numbers of enemies the CPU becomes more bottlenecked so you may have to re-tweak later in the game. If things start to bog down, monitor the FPS again with FRAPS and re-tweak if needed to maintain 30FPS.)

bigpinkdragon286 · Jun 20, 2013

Photonboy, the reason an APU is especially susceptible to poor performance with slow RAM is because that same RAM is directly linked to the graphics cores in the APU. The faster the RAM, the more bandwidth the already constrained graphics resources will have. They graphics cores need all the oomph they can get, as they're already in short supply on an APU.

The CPU portion of the APU chip is hardly going to show much improvement with the faster RAM, but the GPU portion will show marked improvements, which is exactly what the linked article demonstrated.

In case nobody read the article, it recommends 1866 as the base minimum for decent performance, and the best bang per buck really came from the 2133. For 6% more money, you receive 20% more performance.

Seems like a win-win.

photonboy · Jun 20, 2013

bigpinkdragon286 :

You're right, the GPU uses some of the System RAM. There's no dedicated Video RAM. I should have read the article. I couldn't find 2GB modules of 2133MHz but I did find a 2x2GB kit of 1866MHz for pretty cheap:
http://us.ncix.com/products/?sku=78532&vpn=BLE2KIT2G3D1869DE1TX0&manufacture=CRUCIAL%20TECHNOLOGY

bigpinkdragon286 · Jun 20, 2013

Past a certain point, the manufacturers are not going to waste their time and effort on 2 GB modules. That's not where the market is for high performance RAM. It's up to the original poster to determine what he's willing to live with.

papercut03 · Jun 21, 2013

bigpinkdragon286 :

Since Im only going to play LoL, maple story and DOTA2 I think ( hopefully) my computer can live with a 4GB 1600 MHz RAM THANKS SO MUCH FOR ALL OF TEH ANSWERS!

bigpinkdragon286 · Jun 21, 2013

More than welcome! Good luck with your build!

1600 Mhz on AMD A-10 6800k

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