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Thread: 1.333MHz vs 1.600MHz clocked RAM
Demon Cleaner 01:06 6th January 2012
What's the real deal here?

- 8GB of 1.333MHz clocked RAM is 70€
- 8GB of 1.600MHz clocked RAM is 140€

Would you notice a big difference? It's double the price, although it's "only" 70€, but would you notice it in a laptop (Alienware)?
[Reply]
Harrison 13:59 6th January 2012
That seems expensive. Although if this is laptop ram that could be why. I've recently been seeing faster 1600MHz DDR3 desktop ram becoming cheaper than 1333 ram for some places.

Depends on the motherboard and processor. Each type of processor only supports ram up to a certain speed, so anything faster will just be wasted. For example i3 processors only support a maximum ram frequency of 1333MHz so whilst faster ram would work with one it would still run it at that speed.

But that also isn't the whole picture because the ram latency which is normally shown as C9, C8, C7 etc is probably the more important part of the ram to actually look at, rather than the actual clock frequency. The C latency is the number of clock cycles the CPU needs to wait between requesting data from the ram, and the ram sending the data back. So a lower latency ram of C7 would take 7 clock cycles to respond, whereas C9 ram would take 9 cycles. Therefore even if you had 1600MHz ram, if it were rated as C9 it might actually be slower in reality that 1333MHz ram rated as C8 or C7. Does that make sense?

Personally I've not seen all that much evidence to support spending more on faster ram. I normally check to see what the fastest ram is that the processor being used supports and buy that. For my i3 based download server for example I use some Corsair XMS3 1333MHz C8 DDR3 ram as that is the faster it supports. The motherboard supports ram of 2100MHz and faster but it would be waited on the setup.

The only time it is worth buying faster clocked ram is for overclocking. You can fix the ram speed timings in more BIOS' these days to hold the ram at its correct clock speed, to make it stable, but to get the best overclocking, having ram that supports frequencies much higher than the default supported by the CPU mean you don't need to lock the ram speed and can allow it to speed up in line with the FSB being increased, so you benefit from the whole system OC'ing and speeding up as the ram frequency would increase as the FSB increased, and in turn the CPU frequency. So unless you are over clocking don't worry about buying ram faster than you need.

To your actual question, what CPU are you running? And do you have ram already installed? Would you be looking to just expand what is currently installed? Or replace it with all new ram. If expanding then it is best to try and match make and model with your existing ram. If replacing then aim for the fastest ram that is directly supported by the CPU (not the motherboard).

Something else to look at as a very rough idea is the Windows experience index. If you run that test and the ram is lower than other numbers in the results then it might be worth considering upgrading to faster ram if both the CPU and motherboard support it. Otherwise it is just a waste of money.
[Reply]
Demon Cleaner 15:18 6th January 2012
Yes, that makes sense.

I was planning of perhaps getting an Alienware M17x R3 laptop, and in their configuration they also have the higher clocked RAM.

CPU would be an i7-2760QM, but then again, that's 171€ more than for the i7-2670QM, and I don't even know if you would notice that much performance increase, what do you think?

GPU you can chose between the ATI HD6990 or the nVidia GTX580, same price, and I guess also same performance. I would go for the ATI.

The price for the 8GB 1.333MHz clocked RAM is 126€, and for the 8GB 1.600MHz clocked RAM is 192€.
[Reply]
Harrison 16:56 6th January 2012
An ATI HD6990 GPU in a laptop? That is extreme overkill. Those are dual core cards with 4GB vram and can walk all over the GTX580. You would only need that if you were running a couple of 30" monitors in eyefinity mode. For a gaming laptop the much better priced HD6950 is perfect if the screen sizes of most laptops. It is the sweet spot in the current graphics card market.

As for ram, with an i7 processor you probably would benefit from the faster ram, but you also need to question if it is worth the extra €66? Probably if you are spending so much on a laptop in the first place.

BTW, didn't you only recently buy a new laptop? Or was that now quite some time ago?
[Reply]
Demon Cleaner 21:07 6th January 2012
My laptop is now 1.5 years old, and that was not a gaming laptop. It's a Core 2 Duo with a smaller 5770 ATI card. Cannot play games properly that are newer than 2007-8. And I really need a laptop for gaming, because mainly I use it at work, and not at home.

Those 2 cards are at the moment the only options for the Alienware. The screen is a full HD 1920x1080 WLED LCD.

The HD6990M GPU is the mobility version, it has 2GB DDR5 VRAM.

And I'm thinking just the other way around, if I buy already such an expensive laptop, the 66€ won't matter at all
[Reply]
Harrison 06:17 7th January 2012
True, €66 isn't much to add to such an already expensive system. I do think Alienware are overpriced though.
[Reply]
Demon Cleaner 13:56 7th January 2012
I also think that Alienware are a bit overpriced, but if I take a look at some other gaming laptops from other brands, they all are about the same price, or perhaps a bit less, but in my opinion the Alienware just looks really nice, compared to some other, really blocky ones.

I always wanted to configure one at mysn.de (the XMG P701 PRO Gaming), there I would get the same setup for 250-350€ less, but they use the Clevo laptop chassis, which is ok, but doesn't have an outstanding look.

http://www.mysn.de
[Reply]
Demon Cleaner 15:46 9th January 2012
Originally Posted by Demon Cleaner:
CPU would be an i7-2760QM, but then again, that's 171€ more than for the i7-2670QM, and I don't even know if you would notice that much performance increase, what do you think?
What is your opinion about this then?
[Reply]
Harrison 16:38 9th January 2012
OK, this might actually solve your other ram question.

The i7-2670QM has a 6MB cache and is 2.2GHz. Quad core with hyperthreading (8 threads) and Turbo Boost (3.1GHz max), supporting a maximum DDR3 RAM speed of 1333, so it would be pointless to buy ram any faster if you go for this CPU.

The i7-2760QM has a 6MB cache and is 2.4GHz, which isn't a huge amount more. Quad core and hyperthreading, and Turbo Boost (3.5GHz) which might see a fair speed increase over the other slower CPU. Where is differs the most is its ram support as the 2760QM supports up to 1600 ram with a higher memory bandwidth and twice the total ram (32GB).

So the 2760QM will definitely be the faster chip thanks to the higher turbo boost maximum, and support for higher frequency ram, plus providing more ram bandwidth.

The Thermal properties of both are identical at 45W so that won't make any difference to power consumption or heat produced. Something worth noting is that the RRP for both chips is the same on the Intel website so they shouldn't be costing so much different between them.
[Reply]
Demon Cleaner 18:17 9th January 2012
Ok thanks for your reply, so it's worth going for the 2760QM.
[Reply]
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