Which ram to choose for Asus P6X58D Premium MB

[rockitman]

Putting together my own rig and have settled on the Asus P6X58D Premium mother board. Triple channel RAM!! What ever that means.

I need help picking the right brand and amount of RAM.

Will plop in a Intel i7-930 as well as an AMD 5970. Big time gaming is the goal.

From everything I've read so far, I wish to stick to either G.Skill or Corsair.

Money's not a big deal but I will take the cheaper of something as long as it performs well.

Will overclock a bit, whatever the builtin settings for the Asus allow.

Anyways, do I want to get 4GB sticks or 2GB sticks? Does it matter?

What total amount of RAM do I need to have. 6GB? 8GB? 12GB?

In triple channel architecture, does this mean that I need to buy 3 of the same kind of sticks for it to work properly?

 

[saint19]

Hi.

This G.Skill PI series 6GB (3x2GB) 1600 CL7 are a good option for U.

 

[rockitman]

Can I ask why you recommended this model and not the G.Skill Trident 6GB DDR3 2000?

The price difference is only 20 bucks more. Is it because your has a 7 on CAS Latency and the Tridents have a 9?

 

[JackNaylorPE]

90% of the time the Gkill's are going to be the cheapest in their speed and CAS range. However they have tall heat sinks which, if you scour these boards, you will find a lot of people having problems because the tall heat sinks won't let the modules fit under the bigger / better / CPU coolers. Not an issue if you aren't going to overclock and use a high performance air cooler.

The X58 chipset wants you installing RAM modules in groups of three....if you springing for the X58 option, I think you can forget the 1 GB modules and I'd say you are looking for either....

3 x 2GB
6 x 2GB
3 x 4GB
6 x 4GB

Most people are gonna be just fine with 3 x 2GB....note that using up all the RAM slots will sometimes require you to tune down your OC or timings to maintain stability.....since money's not a big deal and you're willing to pay $100 over MSRP for a GFX card, I say why get tightfisted on RAM ?

At this point in time, I'd recommend forking over $220 which will get you 6GB of DDR3-1600 w/ 6-8-6-24 timings
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820226121

Not the best around ....998692's have 6-7-6-18 but they are very tough to find right now.

For $199 you could get CAS 7 w/ 7-8-7-20
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820145286

But for just $20 extra, going for the CAS 6 seems a no brainer to me .....the cheapest CAS 7 is $190 but their timings are a bit slower at 7-8-7-24 and they do have those tall heat spreaders....again, hardly seems worth the $10 savings.

 

[saint19]

Can I ask why you recommended this model and not the G.Skill Trident 6GB DDR3 2000?

The price difference is only 20 bucks more. Is it because your has a 7 on CAS Latency and the Tridents have a 9?

1- Yeah, because a lower CL means a more faster RAM.
2- You won't see a big difference between 1600MHz and 2000MHz, more if that 2000MHz are CL9. Maybe are only $20 more, but don't have sense spend more money in a RAM that isn't as faster as the 1600MHz and even when you can get the same speed OC the 1600MHz RAM.