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Usacomp2k3 wrote:

The Egg wrote:

Usacomp2k3 wrote:

Both of ya'll are saying that 16GB + RX570 would give better gaming performance than 8GB + RX580? That's ridiculous.

It's probably in your best interest not to put words in people's mouths like that in person. Not only did I not say anything resembling that, I never even mentioned videocards. You're completely full of it.

Then the only other option is that he should do it even though it would give worse performance? The OP was very clear that the budget is a hard number so any extra spent on RAM would have to be taken from another item.

EDIT: I'm not trying to be antagonistic, so sorry if it came across a little blunt. I'd like to hear your logic and recommendations on a better trade-off. Maybe a cheaper monitor?

You might not have had malicious intent, but turning a RAM suggestion into making performance claims about X with videocard A and Y with videocard B (when videocards were never even mentioned) is baloney.

My recommendation.....if there's a hard cap on the budget, maybe consider delaying the purchase for a month or so until more money can be saved. Alternately he could buy 1x8GB now (and temporarily take the performance hit of running in single-channel) and then the other 8GB once he's saved up. Filling both available slots with 2x4GB leaves him nowhere to go. He mentioned it's a gaming system, and we already see 8GB causing performance loss.

The Egg wrote:

You might not have had malicious intent, but turning a RAM suggestion into making performance claims about X with videocard A and Y with videocard B (when videocards were never even mentioned) is baloney.

It was mentioned by the OP multiple times:

rinshun wrote:

The budget is very tight; I'm considering a 150~250USD for each part: CPU, GPU and monitor. Probably I'll stick on the lower end for the CPU ~150 and in the middle range for the GPU and monitor ~200 each.

Is adding extra 8GB of RAM going to give me increased marginal performance per dollar compared to upgrading the other stuff? I still don't know. I'm looking for more info. The jump from the 570 to the 580 definetly looks better on paper. But can extra ram reduce time beyond 50ms more than the GPU upgrade? I'ts hard to compare =(

Also, all the benchmarks were tested in the highest quality, can settings be lowered to reduce ram usage? Wich ones? I thought view distance, for example, was tied to the VRAM...

rinshun wrote:

Going for 16GB would increase the system cost considerably, and I could use that money to buy a better GPU or Monitor. So, 16Gb just for future proofing does not look like a good deal. I would only consider it if it severely reduce stutters or other undesireable things.

The Egg wrote:

Filling both available slots with 2x4GB leaves him nowhere to go.

I definitely agree with this. Unless you are going mini-ITX, many MicroATX boards have 4 slots, like this one: https://www.amazon.com/GIGABYTE-B450M-D ... 07FWVJSHC/ I don't know how much cheaper one with only 2 slots would be.

Usacomp2k3 wrote:

Both of ya'll are saying that 16GB + RX570 would give better gaming performance than 8GB + RX580? That's ridiculous.

Here let me quote what I said since you missed it:

"You can skimp a little bit on cpu but not on ram and GPU when playing games."

And so to EXPAND:

I would drop your cpu back a little bit but keep the 2x8gb and rx 580.

Why?

1 - Because going with 1x8gb only for future expansion cuts into your current performance by about 20%
2 - ram is not that expansive (and prices are dropping)
3 - you can always upgrade your cpu later so going with a dual core with HT now and then in one or two years getting a used quad core from ebay may be a good path to take.
4 - games are using more and more ram and vram as time goes on so getting more ram now and a good gpu is a hedge against future performance needs.

When you are dealing with a limited budget sometimes it is better to look at upgrading older machines instead of buying everything new.
The core i7 2600k in my sig is a used machine. So far the only upgrades it has needed is a better heatsink, new power supply, bigger ssd, and radeon rx580 8gb.

I'll buck the trend and recommend 8GB (conditionally).

Most games have to be able to run in ~5GB at some settings because that's what consoles have got free (3GB for background stuff + 5GB for the game, and mind that that 5GB is shared with VRAM over there). If that doesn't work at max settings, it probably will with textures and/or some mesh setting turned down one notch. I've got 16 myself, but hardly ever manage to use more than 8 unless I know I'm doing something weird.

Two exceptions are that occasional games just do take a ton of RAM (mainly looking at Star Citizen here) and if you like to keep Chrome open with a bunch of tabs and WU kicks in the background RAM use may well get too high for 8 to be comfortable.

If you're alright with running textures down a notch from max sometimes, don't plan on gaming with too much background RAM use, and aren't looking at any particularly heavy PC-only titles, I think 8GB with the difference in money going to some other component would be a better experience. If nothing else, RAM is now cheap to upgrade to 16 later compared to other stuff, even if you only have two slots and have to discard the old stuff.

synthtel2 wrote:

I'll buck the trend and recommend 8GB (conditionally).

This.

Very few games will be bottlenecked by 8 GB vs 16 GB of RAM.

99% of 3D games will be bottlenecked by a 570 vs a 580. Especially now that 580 8 GB prices are dropping to as low as $150-170, it's really not worth the savings from going with a 570 instead.

Also, get a motherboard with 4 slots. How much would you save by going 2-slots? $10? $20? It is absolutely not worth doing so unless ITX is a requirement.

Voldenuit wrote:

synthtel2 wrote:

I'll buck the trend and recommend 8GB (conditionally).

Also, get a motherboard with 4 slots. How much would you save by going 2-slots? $10? $20? It is absolutely not worth doing so unless ITX is a requirement.

100 BRL. It's not THAT expensive. But it's half of the amount of going for the 16GB, for no extra performance.

I think I have no choice. I must get the 580 because the 570 is way worse. But I also must get the 16GB, because the trend is to increase the amount needed. So I'll settle for 1x8GB for now. And then upgrade to 16GB when needed, if needed. Some tests shows single channel isn't that bad... like these ones:
https://techguided.com/single-channel-v ... d-channel/
https://www.hardwaresecrets.com/does-du ... ormance/7/
https://beebom.com/single-channel-vs-du ... el-memory/

I think I was overevaluating the value of dual channel. Now that's sound like a good deal.

Thank you all for the insights! I love you =)

rinshun wrote:

Voldenuit wrote:

synthtel2 wrote:

I'll buck the trend and recommend 8GB (conditionally).

Also, get a motherboard with 4 slots. How much would you save by going 2-slots? $10? $20? It is absolutely not worth doing so unless ITX is a requirement.

100 BRL. It's not THAT expensive. But it's half of the amount of going for the 16GB, for no extra performance.

I think I have no choice. I must get the 580 because the 570 is way worse. But I also must get the 16GB, because the trend is to increase the amount needed. So I'll settle for 1x8GB for now. And then upgrade to 16GB when needed, if needed. Some tests shows single channel isn't that bad... like these ones:
https://techguided.com/single-channel-v ... d-channel/
https://www.hardwaresecrets.com/does-du ... ormance/7/
https://beebom.com/single-channel-vs-du ... el-memory/

I think I was overevaluating the value of dual channel. Now that's sound like a good deal.

Thank you all for the insights! I love you =)

I think you've found a good compromise for your budget. As DRAM prices are falling, you can save up some money and pick up another stick later this year.

Enjoy your new PC.

rinshun wrote:

I think I have no choice. I must get the 580 because the 570 is way worse. But I also must get the 16GB, because the trend is to increase the amount needed. So I'll settle for 1x8GB for now. And then upgrade to 16GB when needed, if needed. Some tests shows single channel isn't that bad... like these ones:
https://techguided.com/single-channel-v ... d-channel/
https://www.hardwaresecrets.com/does-du ... ormance/7/
https://beebom.com/single-channel-vs-du ... el-memory/

I think I was overevaluating the value of dual channel. Now that's sound like a good deal.

Those significantly contradict other results I've seen and massively contradict my own experiences. IME, that much memory performance results in a night-and-day difference across a variety of workloads, a particularly big one being stutter in gaming. Part of the difference will be that AAA titles seem to on average be much less bound by memory performance than lower-budget ones (and reviews don't test anything low-budget), but those three are far more optimistic about single-channel than that can explain. All three have at least a bit of other weirdness in them:

* Techguided's and Beebom's baseline results both look very low, as if they're GPU-bound. Techguided really shouldn't be with an 8700K and 1070 at 1920x1200. Beebom didn't share their test rig and settings, but if they're CPU-bound, it's because their CPU is laughably potato. Memory performance is an aspect of CPU-side performance, and if the CPU already isn't the limit, that's about how the results could be expected to look.

* Hardware Secrets is testing with a 5775C, which has a fourth cache level and should be far less sensitive to memory performance than CPUs people are actually using. While I don't have an explanation for it, I have nowhere else ever seen anything that resembles their large number of results that give single-channel the advantage.

If your framerate targets are low enough that this still seems reasonable, I would go for 8GB of dual-channel memory and drop to a cheaper CPU. I would absolutely take a 2200G or i3-8100 with dual-channel memory over a 2600 or i5-8400 with single-channel memory.

I don't mean to hijack the thread -apologies to the original poster- but while you're at it, one small question. I have 8GBs of ram on a system with only two dimm slots. And I can't find my particular brand/type of DDR4 "Patriot" ram the system came with, any more. Will it work in dual channel with any other dimm, so long as the timings coincide? Regardless of single/dual rank and things like that? thanks!

just brew it! wrote:

ptsant wrote:

1. RAM prices are going down from a very long period of very high prices. A 32GB kit used to cost $200, went up to $400 and is now back to about $240. And I am using the exact same kit (Corsair 3000C15 LPX) as an example. So, you won't be buying RAM at a very bad time and it might even be worth waiting a little bit.

Yeah, I'd noticed that unbuffered non-ECC is finally coming back down. But for some reason unbuffered ECC hasn't, and in some cases has even risen slightly. WTF. It's the same damn chips; ECC modules just have them in multiples of 9 instead of 8.

There is a lack of ECC in the channel. I ordered the top-end Samsung B-die ECC @ 2666 and had to wait 3 weeks for it. I paid $350, which is sort of OK for 2x16GB B-die. A lot of money, but not completely unreasonable. Still haven't put it in the MB because I can't afford the down time, but will be back with news on how well it works. Hope to get at least 3000C15 out of it with my Ryzen 1700X.

rinshun wrote:

I think I have no choice. I must get the 580 because the 570 is way worse. But I also must get the 16GB, because the trend is to increase the amount needed. So I'll settle for 1x8GB for now. And then upgrade to 16GB when needed, if needed. Some tests shows single channel isn't that bad... like these ones:
https://techguided.com/single-channel-v ... d-channel/
https://www.hardwaresecrets.com/does-du ... ormance/7/
https://beebom.com/single-channel-vs-du ... el-memory/

I think I was overevaluating the value of dual channel. Now that's sound like a good deal.

You will be losing something like 10-20% with single channel, depending on the game. However, the 580 is definitely a more powerful card and will give you several years of very comfortable gaming at 1080p. This is a good compromise, but do plan for the second 8GB stick as soon as possible (not only for performance, but also because (a) prices may rise again and (b) you may have a hard time finding the exact same RAM model and mixing speeds/qualities is not a good idea).

christos_thski wrote:

I don't mean to hijack the thread -apologies to the original poster- but while you're at it, one small question. I have 8GBs of ram on a system with only two dimm slots. And I can't find my particular brand/type of DDR4 "Patriot" ram the system came with, any more. Will it work in dual channel with any other dimm, so long as the timings coincide? Regardless of single/dual rank and things like that? thanks!

I would find the exact timings (ideally also the kind of die) and order the closest possible match. I don't think you have dual rank, I believe most 8GB sticks are single-rank. You might need to manually tune the timings to the lowest common denominator, but if both are of reasonable quality, it should work.

ptsant wrote:

I would find the exact timings (ideally also the kind of die) and order the closest possible match. I don't think you have dual rank, I believe most 8GB sticks are single-rank. You might need to manually tune the timings to the lowest common denominator, but if both are of reasonable quality, it should work.

Agreed.

While it is nice to have a machine with all the same brand and model of memory it is not actually required.

As long as the numbers are close it will work.
In fact often even if the numbers are wildly different it will still work just at whichever is lowest common denominator.

I.E. if you have a 2gb dimm and 4gb dimm you still get 6gb ram and if one is pc4300 and the other is pc5200 then both dimms with run at pc4300.
Sure its not recommended as system stability might be affected but it should still work.

Thank you! Unfortunately I seem to be in possession of an odd duck. It is a dual rank 8GB dimm stick. Patriot PSD48G240082H.

So does this advice still hold, or does the dual rank complicate things?

To the OP: for purely gaming, 8gb is sufficient at the moment and if the choice boiled down to RX570+16gb vs RX580+8gb I would take the RX580. However, if you're in an area where a lot of people resell their computer stuff (e.g. on craigslist or the equivalent), consider that you could sell the RX570 for ~50-60% of your original price and put that towards a GPU upgrade later. Neither GPU is going to feel very fast in a few years, but the 570 will definitely age worse than the 580.

I play XCOM2 and Battletech at 4k with my geforce 1080, and Win10 shows that I'm regularly using ~7.8 gB of memory. That's with only the game and Steam running - I don't have any stuttering or anything, but if you're playing something like Shadow of the Tomb Raider or Far Cry 5 you could conceivably start paging to disk at that resolution. It really depends if you're willing to turn down detail settings.

christos_thski wrote:

Thank you! Unfortunately I seem to be in possession of an odd duck. It is a dual rank 8GB dimm stick. Patriot PSD48G240082H.

So does this advice still hold, or does the dual rank complicate things?

The good news is that almost anything you buy now will be faster. So, you will definitely be able to get cheap ram that works at the same Freq/CL. However, your memory is at 1.2V, while high-speed DDR4 is often at 1.35V. Be careful not to buy 1.35V memory, or, if you buy 1.35V RAM, make sure it supports (slower) modes at 1.2V.

Anything that is 1.2V / 2666CL15-16 should have no difficulty running at the specs of your old RAM. There is no cost benefit in get anything slower than that, in my opinion, as you are already in the $50 range for 8GB. The prices increase steeply over 3000C15, don't waste your money there.

This is an example at $50:
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product. ... 6820164016
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product. ... 6820104745

Note that if you have a hard time using them together, you could possibly increase RAM voltage to 1.25V or so. Generally, most people agree that anything below 1.35V is safe.

There's also very little harm in running 1.2V memory at 1.35V.

Thank so much for the informative answers, and apologies to the op on piggy-backing this to his thread!

christos_thski wrote:

Thank so much for the informative answers, and apologies to the op on piggy-backing this to his thread!

No problem.

In most cases ram is pretty flexible unless you are working the limits such as over or underclocking.
Once you've been around a while working on lots of machines you start to see all kinds of weird memory configurations that just seem to work.

The wife's laptop is a good example since it has a 4gb single rank sodimm and a 8gb sodimm dual rank sodimm giving you 12 gb of ram. (ddr3L)

Aranarth wrote:

The wife's laptop is a good example since it has a 4gb single rank sodimm and a 8gb sodimm dual rank sodimm giving you 12 gb of ram. (ddr3L)

The other interesting part about that is that it will also run dual-channel for the first 8 GB of memory space and single channel for the last 4 GB. Interesting to benchmark for sure.