2 vs 4 modules
- Thread starter Darksin
- Start date
Your friend is incorrect but overall unless you are doing overclocking it wont matter either way besides limiting your future capacity if you wanted to expand it.
The reason you want less with overclocking is less variables to deal with and the chances of two sticks acting closer together are a lot better than four, especially if you didn't buy the four as a set.
Perhaps he is thinking of socket 2011 and 1366 systems where you have three and four channel setups in which case yes you do want three or four dimms as opposed to two.
The reason you want less with overclocking is less variables to deal with and the chances of two sticks acting closer together are a lot better than four, especially if you didn't buy the four as a set.
Perhaps he is thinking of socket 2011 and 1366 systems where you have three and four channel setups in which case yes you do want three or four dimms as opposed to two.
- Jun 19, 2011
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About the only time you will notice a difference between 2 modules vs 4 is if the motherboard supports quad channel memory, and as far as I know only socket 2011 boards support quad channel. This is assuming the dimms have the same frequency and CAS. Here's a post with some more information.
http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/285158-30-sandy-bridge-dimm
http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/285158-30-sandy-bridge-dimm
It depends on your motherboard's memory controller.
If you have a 2 channel memory controller, then the most efficient configuration will be two modules of equal sized ram.
If you have a 4 channel memory controller, then the most efficient configuration would be four equal sized ram sticks.
But the difference is not large should you not have the most optimum configuration.
CPU operation is focused on memory in the L1 cache. Having more L1, L2, and L3 cache will make the biggest difference to memory intensive computing. Even if there is a cache miss, it will only take a matter of nanoseconds to address the RAM modules.
Overclocked, perfectly matched memory can add a few frames per second to a game (like Battlefield for example) and I would expect a similar incremental improvement with your emulators. But it won't make a large difference.
Just packing as much ram into your system as you can afford will have a bigger impact than worrying about 2 or 4 modules.
If you have a 2 channel memory controller, then the most efficient configuration will be two modules of equal sized ram.
If you have a 4 channel memory controller, then the most efficient configuration would be four equal sized ram sticks.
But the difference is not large should you not have the most optimum configuration.
CPU operation is focused on memory in the L1 cache. Having more L1, L2, and L3 cache will make the biggest difference to memory intensive computing. Even if there is a cache miss, it will only take a matter of nanoseconds to address the RAM modules.
Overclocked, perfectly matched memory can add a few frames per second to a game (like Battlefield for example) and I would expect a similar incremental improvement with your emulators. But it won't make a large difference.
Just packing as much ram into your system as you can afford will have a bigger impact than worrying about 2 or 4 modules.
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