8 GB + 4GB = Compatible?

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Timmy73r

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Apr 26, 2014
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Hi all. I have my new PC which has 2 x 4GB sticks of DDR Corsair Vengeance running at 1600MHz.

Looking at my old PC, it's over 7 years old. It was a solid good build but I feel it's far to outdated to sell. But with RAM being expensive, I notice the RAM I have there is in good condition but also old. It's 2 x 2 GB sticks of Corsair DDR2 at 800 Mhz.

Would I be fine putting it in my new build, bringing the total RAM up to 12 GB? I understand they're 2 very different types. However I can dual channel both seperately. Perhaps I'll get a small performance increase?
 
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mickypheonix

mickypheonix

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Mar 9, 2014
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Hi Timmy73r
Mixing ram is not recommended it can be very problematic and i am asuming you are meaning that the vengance is DDR3
you cannot mix ddr2 and ddr3 modules even if the board accepts both and with the speeds at 1600mhz and 800mhz and totally different timings even if they were both ddr3 you would still have problems
 
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InvalidError

InvalidError

Titan
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May 18, 2007
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You want to mix DDR2 and DDR3? That is not possible in any way since the CPU or chipset (whichever has the memory controller in your case) can only handle one memory timing type at a time and the motherboard can only provide one set of memory voltages at a time as well so the DDR2 voltages would fry your DDR3 memory and the DDR3 voltages would be insufficient to operate the DDR2 memory.

So, even if your motherboard has slots for DDR2 and DDR3, you can only use one memory type at a time.

Also, most DDR2 motherboards cannot handle DIMMs larger than 2GB so the most memory you can put in your PC if it has four DDR2 slots is probably 8GB.
 
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Tradesman1

Tradesman1

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Jun 5, 2013
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As mentioned above by others, it's not a good idea to mix DRAM, even packages of the same exact model, that said, if you do try and have problems, give me a shout, no guarantees, but can often get balky sticks to play with voltage and timings adjustments
 
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Timmy73r

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Apr 26, 2014
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Thanks for the answers here. I have some RAM in another PC which is DDR3, I think running same Mhz but it's from Ripjaw not corsair. Would that be okay to use?
 
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InvalidError

InvalidError

Titan
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If you run the DIMMs at the slowest clock and timings of the bunch, it will most likely work fine.

As long as you do not over-volt your RAM or zap your DIMMs with static during the swap process, there should be no harm in trying. You may want to run memtest86 for a few hours just to rule out any obvious issues.
 
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