Better to have less RAM or mix PC3-8500 with PC3-10666?

[chitownguy5]

I'm upgrading the RAM on a machine that currently has 6 GB of RAM installed by Dell. The RAM I purchased is 8GB of PC3-10666 low latency RAM.

1. Am I better off just putting in the 8GB and taking out the 6GB?

2. If I go for the 14GB configuration, with the old memory on one channel/bank and the new memory on the other channel/bank, will the performance be brought down to the lowest performing pair?

3. With 14GB of RAM, should I set the swap file size to zero to ensure Windows does not try to use a swap file?

 

[rolli59]

What system?

 

[chitownguy5]

XPS 8300 with Core i7-2600.

 

[rolli59]

OK lga 1155 with 4 ram slots so the max you can have in is 2 x 2gb sticks plus 2 x 4GB sticks. You can try that but for most uses 8GB is plenty.

 

[gnomio]

Put them all in or all that you can. Dont worry bout the speed. With SB it doesnt really make a difference as they got nice big fat caches

 

[chitownguy5]

SB?

 

[rolli59]

SB=Sandy Bridge=LGA1155=I7 2600

 

[gnomio]

SB=Sandy Bridge=LGA1155=I7 2600

Thanks. What he said