cyberstatic

Distinguished
Oct 9, 2003
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18,510
hi ive been reading everything i can find on dual channel ddr for over a week now and the one thing i cant find, is if it's ok to use different chip pairs, like i have 1 Kingston Hyper X 256mb 3200 chip allready, and i want to buy 3 more chips of the same brand model and speed with the exception of size, id like to get another 256mb and 2 512mb's would it work in the configuration of

slot 0 - king hyper X 3200 256mb
slot 1 - king hyper X 3200 512mb
slot 2 - king hyper X 3200 256mb
slot 3 - king hyper X 3200 512mb

or do i need to get all 4 chips the same? all i know is that the pairs themselves have to be identical, but i cant find anything that says if you can use 2 different pairs. if anyone knows id appreciate the input

and i have a P4 2.4C on an Intel D875PBZ and no im not planning to OC not that i could do it much on this MB anyways lol.
 

pIII_Man

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Mar 19, 2003
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what you have listed above is do-able as long as the amount of ram is balenced between the 2 memory controllors you are fine.

I would recomend against using an intel board, because running 4 memory sticks in dual channel with PAT enabled is very hard on memory, and at stock voltage and timmings your mem might not be able to do it. Check out the abit IS7 or asus p4p800, both are pat enabled 865pe chipsets that should perform better than the intel board (and have memory timming voltage and overclocking options).


If it isn't a P6 then it isn't a procesor
110% BX fanboy
 

cyberstatic

Distinguished
Oct 9, 2003
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18,510
well i allready have the board ive had it for a few months, so a different one isnt really an option, and yes id like 1-1.5gb's of ram, now about ballancing the ram between the controllers, this is the way i understand it im not sure how accurate it is tho

Channel A which has slots 0 and 1 is on one controller
Channel B which has slots 2 and 3 is on the other controller is this right?

as for being hard on the ram, im not planning on over clocking or pushing the latencys lower then spec, have really good case cooling and if neccisary i can raise the latencys a little hyper X runs optimal range so i think even if i had to raise the latencys to an average range it would be worth it for the bandwith this setup should give me right?
 

pIII_Man

Splendid
Mar 19, 2003
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correct, you are actually going to have very good memory performance, because the 865/875 based boards seem to perform best with 4 modules installed.

About the memory controlors just picture it visually, the batch of memory slots close to eachother share the same controllor then there is a space and 2 other memory slots close together, these share the other controlor.

You may not even have to relax the timmings, just bump up the vdimm, ram signaling voltage, by .1 -.2v and you should be good to go.


If it isn't a P6 then it isn't a procesor
110% BX fanboy