How much does RAM speed matter?

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How much does RAM speed matter, especially if it's not that high-end?
For example, if you got two systems, one with 1333mhz ddr3 and the other with 1600mhz ddr3. Would you see any difference in general performance. I'm not talking about synthetic benchmarks and stuff, i just need to know real life performance for the average user or casual gamer.
Considering all other components identical, does it make a difference?
 
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How much does RAM speed matter?
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It depends on several factors. Most importantly what platform are you talking about?

AMD FX - ~DDR3 1866

Sandy Bridge - DDR3 1600

Ivy Bridge - DDR3 1866

Haswell - DDR3 2133

Haswell refresh / Devil's Canyon - DDR3 2400

Skylake - DDR4 3200 ( or faster )

Kaby Lake - DDR4 3600 ( or faster )

Ryzen - Too new to say.

^ Optimal speeds with an unlocked CPU and an enthusiast chipset motherboard for the last several generations.

RAM speeds matter quite a bit depending on what you're talking about. Only a few games like Fallout 4 and Arma III really scale well with faster RAM but most everything else does. You almost never want to go with the lowest speed unless you're using a locked CPU and...
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CyberBlade

CyberBlade

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Feb 9, 2017
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Not much difference I think about 3 to 5% faster. An average user will not be able to see any difference depends upon CAS latency. But if I am getting 1600 at the same price of 1333 I will go for 1600.
 
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How much does RAM speed matter?
Click to expand...

It depends on several factors. Most importantly what platform are you talking about?

AMD FX - ~DDR3 1866

Sandy Bridge - DDR3 1600

Ivy Bridge - DDR3 1866

Haswell - DDR3 2133

Haswell refresh / Devil's Canyon - DDR3 2400

Skylake - DDR4 3200 ( or faster )

Kaby Lake - DDR4 3600 ( or faster )

Ryzen - Too new to say.

^ Optimal speeds with an unlocked CPU and an enthusiast chipset motherboard for the last several generations.

RAM speeds matter quite a bit depending on what you're talking about. Only a few games like Fallout 4 and Arma III really scale well with faster RAM but most everything else does. You almost never want to go with the lowest speed unless you're using a locked CPU and chipset and don't have a choice.
 
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Thanks for your replies guys. Actually I'm not looking to buy ram or even considering any upgrade.
I just wanted to know the difference, for knowledge.

Another thing i would like to ask, what exactly is Ram timings. Mine is 1333mhz ddr3 running at 9-9-9-24. Now what does that mean? And different speeds, like 1600mhz or 1800mhz, would have different timings? Or they could be identical to the ones in a 1333mhz memory.
 
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Standard 1.5v DDR3 1600 9-9-9-24 2T. That's all you need. You can probably get DDR3 1866 or even 2133 running on an i5 2500K or i7 2600K and P67/Z68/Z77 ( Z77 is more likely for faster stuff ) but the integrated memory controller stops seeing real gains over DDR3 1600. If this makes sense there are large gains from DDR3 1333 - - - - - > DDR3 1600 - - > DDR3 1866 - > DDR3 2133 that get smaller as you go faster.
 
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http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2164432,00.asp

Lower is better.
 
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RCFProd

RCFProd

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It matters more than most people think, mainly in CPU intensive games when playing at high framerates though. If you're using a 60/75Hz monitor it probably doesn't matter in any case.

Open world games = CPU intensive

DDR4-2133 vs DDR4-2800 = ~12 FPS+ boosts in Far Cry Primal, tested by Digital Foundry
DDR4-2133 vs DDR4-2800 = ~15 FPS+ boosts in The Witcher 3, tested by Digital Foundry
DDR4-2133 vs DDR4-2800 = ~15 FPS+ boosts in GTA V, also tested by Digital Foundry.

 
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