Should I Upgrade to 2GB or 3GB of RAM for P4 Machine?

[GSZX1337]

Well, we had a CPU conversation earlier:
http://www.racketboy.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4080

Seems like the consensus was that it wasn't really worth it.

And the RAM is DDR PC2700

Yeah, but that was for a P4, not for a different CPU.

[racketboy]

Well, we had a CPU conversation earlier:
http://www.racketboy.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4080

Seems like the consensus was that it wasn't really worth it.

And the RAM is DDR PC2700

Yeah, but that was for a P4, not for a different CPU.

But if I would need a new mobo for a different CPU. I'm not looking to do all that swapping.

[lordofduct]

3 gigs really isn't worth it on that rig... you will hardly notice the difference to the 2 gigs for most of the stuff you are doing. And your points about Photoshop are on the dot, you aren't going to see the 3 gigs in most of those applications.

What I'd work on if you want to stick to the P4 is to tweak the system out by making all the bottle necks work together. What I mean is get some RAM that communicates across the bus to that processor at the same speed.

I'd buy two 1 gig sticks of DDR400 (PC3200) to match the 200mhz clock to the quad pumped 200mhz FSB (it says 800, but it technically is 200... this is if its the processor you talk about in the other thread). The just take the 2 512 sticks out completely. I'm pretty sure this would actually do more for your machine then 3 gigs of PC2700.

Also you should purge your clipboard as often as possible in photoshop with in the limitations of what you need it for. I'm also guessing you might copy lots of pics from websites as well (I know I do), it is usually better to save those files in some folder to avoid filling up windows clipboard(I have one called zzzTemp at the root of my second hard drive). Though most of this is probably stuff you already know when using art programs.

I do most of my dev on an old 1.4 ghz P4 with a gig of RAM (technically OC'd, but that's the computers fault, it won't run at stock speed for some reason). I usually have Visual C#, Photoshop CS2, Flash CS3, Winamp, Firefox, and several other smaller programs open that eat up that little machine. So I take precautions for things.

1)I constantly go in and make sure any clipboard is empty
2)I have all my visual settings down on most of my programs and turn them on when needed (i.e. Quicktime, Flash, the XP bubbly look of windows, that sort).
3)Consistently dump all needed data into temporary files on my second HDD to reopen later when I need it.

I've cooked this machine for a long time and it does everything I need it to. It chugs at some of the stuff, like my music stutters when I go to compile my latest build for a game or something, but it gets the job done and I don't need some super machine to do it. Most of these precautions add a little more time to some tasks, but it works out in the long run for me.

[racketboy]

So you're saying 1GB of 3200 RAM would be better than 2GB of 2700 RAM?
Or just that 2GB of 3200 would be better than 3GB of 2700?

[marurun]

Frankly, unless you are running a web server and serving all your content out of a RAM cache that's under constant heavy load, you probably won't notice that much different between PC2700 and PC3200. That said, the price difference is probably minimal. But regardless of the speed, 3 GB is always better than 2 GB. The question is, will you notice. My guess is, unless you are running Vista, you don't need 3 GB of RAM for almost anything and you will not notice a real difference. For Windows XP, any RAM over 2 GB is largely pointless unless you have an industry-specific need (heavy duty 3DS Max, anyone?).

[opethfan]

The problem with DDR1 RAM is that its often 2-3x the price of DDR2 RAM. I'll use Canadian site NCIX for reference, but our currencies are so similar, there shouldn't be a problem.
http://www.ncix.com/products/index.php? ... omoid=1001
$58 for 1GB of PC3200.

http://www.ncix.com/products/index.php? ... omoid=1001
$19 for 1GB of PC2-5300, which is also much faster.

Your mobo is either socket 423 or more likely 478, so maybe you should start saving the ol' pennies for a new system, as the whole system now is reaching the end of its life unfortunately.

[lordofduct]

So you're saying 1GB of 3200 RAM would be better than 2GB of 2700 RAM?
Or just that 2GB of 3200 would be better than 3GB of 2700?

Well the significance changes in that scenario. I'm considering all your roles here...

In an XP machine (marurun brings up some good points of what I mean), 3 gigs isn't really noticeable in comparison to 2 gigs. You aren't accessing that much data. You aren't playing the latest games on the machine (or you'd be looking for a new processor) and I don't think you are doing massive high poly work or giant architectual and drafting plans. You aren't throwing data like that around, so 3 gigs is a little over kill.

What you are doing is throwing stuff to and from the RAM a lot. You're surfing web pages, dragging images around, altering them and writing new stuff down. You have a large amount of dynamic data shifting around, nothing on a massive scale... but a pretty good size of it. 2 gigs will suffice all this work, but taking some load of that north bridge and processor by syncing the clock speed of the RAM to the FSB would allow for much smoother trips to and from the RAM. Faster RAM sometimes isn't better if you have a bottle neck in the way between it (i.e. a 667mhz FSB throwing at PC3200, or 800mhz FSB throwing at PC2700)... In your situation the data your processor pulls and throws at the RAM has to be regulated by the northbridge so that you don't throw to much data at it at once. It's like pushing a line of cars at 60mph down a free way and running into a 45mph zone... it backs everything up. So the northbridge tells the processor to stall out from sending data so that the freeway can clear up and fit the next bunch coming.

Now yes many can contest that the difference is insignificant to an extent... and to an extent you probably don't care. But if you're trying to get as much life out of a dieing processor why not free some of the cycles up for something better then standing in line to send or receive more data from RAM. It's just mathematically cleaner.

Oh and on Newegg.com you can get 2 gigs of DDR400 (PC3200) for 80 to 100 dollars (2X 1gig sticks)

It was all merely a suggestion... the root of what I had to say is just that 2 gigs is more then sufficient. 3 gigs just ain't worth it.

[racketboy]

can I not have two sets of RAM of different speeds? or does it just run them all at the slowest?

[lordofduct]

can I not have two sets of RAM of different speeds? or does it just run them all at the slowest?

It'll run them at the same possible speed

you could run your pc2700 at 200mhz with some pc3200, if your mobo supports overclocking... but it'll diminish the life span of the RAM a lot.

[edit]
you know this might be for a lost cause anyways... you should check you mobo's docs to see what RAM it supports. If I remember correctly you are talking about a Dell, and I know the Dell has really weird chip sets back when they were throwing that series of P4s into their machines. They were advertised as intel chipsets, but they had weird limitations on them.

[racketboy]

The Dell was a different machine.
This is one I built with an Intel mobo
http://www.intel.com/design/motherbd/bz/index.htm