G Skill Flare DDR3 RAM

[ultimatepc]

Hey guys, I want to buy 8GB of the GSkill Flare DDR3-2000 CL 7-9-7-24 RAM but on GSkills website it says that " *G.Skill guarantees 2 Dimms dual channel operation would reach announced specification. " But I want to buy 4 x 2GB modules. So will the speed and timings still remain as the announced specifications?? And will my CPU and RAM work fine??
(The RAM kit name is: "[ FLS ] F3-16000CL7Q-8GBFLS (2Gx4) " ) [The motherboard does support the RAM, the 4GB kit though they dont spesify any motherboards for the 8GB kit but its the same RAM just more,....)

My syste Specs is:
-AMD Phenom 2 X6 1090T CPU,
- ASUS M4A89GTD PRO/USB3 Motherboard,
-850W Corsair PSU,
-ATI Radeon 5 870 1GB Graphics Card,
-2TB HDD etc.

Can anyone shed some light on the situation please??

Thanx.

[hawk]

Hey all,

Sorry to hijack the thread but I was actually just about to ask the exact same question
Would 2 sets of F3-16000CL7D-4GBFLS work with the following?

AMD X6 1090t
Asus Crosshair IV Formula
ATI HD 4850 1GB
Corsair HX620W PSU
etc

Or is the F3-16000CL8D-8GBFLS set the only safe bet? (Can't find any for sale in Aus...)

Cheers

Edit:
Or what about these? F3-12800CL9D-8GBRL
Would CAS7 be realistic with these?

[Onslaught2k3]

Yes the ram definitely will run at spec. However, as admins through this forum keep saying manual tweaking of timings and voltages are a must through your manufacturers bios page when your computer goes through POST. It says guaranteed operation with two dims populated meaning a minimum of two sticks are required to run the flare series memory In Dual channel. Since you have 2000mhz rated flare memory modules, try to run them 7-8-7-24-1t in bios. Also, for MSI users look up the XMP profile for your memory and manually set the timings and voltages. My experience with other motherboards aren't as solid so I apologize to those who don't use MSI as their mobo maker of choice. The only way to get your DDR3 memory to run beyond 1600 MHz is to increase the fsb beyond 200 MHz (which your C3 phenom should easily be able to do). Btw, phenom ii processors lock memory operation at 1600 MHz ddr3 so that's why increasing the fsb is mandatory. I wish you two luck with getting your modules to run at specification. Also, you may need to increase the CPU-NB voltages as that's the memory controller voltage within the CPU to get it to operate the ram beyond 1600 MHz.

[GSKILL TECH]

In addition to onslaught2k3's good expalanation, 4 modules (full slots) are very stressful on the memory controller. As a result, boosting the CPU-NB Voltage may be necessary.

So yes, 2 sticks will work just fine, 4 sticks will require memory controller voltage tweaking. For this reason, we suggest higher capacity memory. If you want 8GB for sure, you should always buy 2 x 4GB instead of 4 x 2GB.

Thank you
GSKILL TECH

[ultimatepc]

RAM Capasity

Thank you very much for that detailed reply guys,.....

Your answer brought me to my next question:

How much RAM do I actually need??
You have my system specs at the top of the form, I do everything like gaming, aps, video encoding etc but nothing intensly. All just for fun!!
If I onley buy 4GB (2GB x 2) Will that be suficiant for my system or will it drag down my performance??

What is the recomended capasity for now and to be relitively future proof as far as RAM is conserned??

Thanx
:-)

[GSKILL TECH]

4GB should be OK, unless you want to encode, edit, game, all at the same time. Future proof, then 8GB, 4GB will be minimum soon enough.

Thank you
GSKILL TECH

[ultimatepc]

Thank you very much.
I see my previous response did not load.

I decided to go for the 2x 4GB modules but one of my friends said that 4 x 2GB modules will far out perform 2 x 4GB modules because I use all the memory lanes?? Will this be true and make that much of a difference or will the performance be the same?? I also see that the latency of the 4GB module is CL 8-9-8-24 and not CL 7-8-7-24 like the 2GB modules. Will you still recommend 2 x 4GB modules?? I am looking to place my order in this week, so is quite keen to finalize everything.

Kind Regards

[wevsspot]

I respectfully disagree with your friend.

Will you see some performance differences in synthetic benchmarks - probably yes.

Will you notice any performance differences in real world use - the answer is definitely not.

The higher density memory sticks will put less load on the memory controller, and you have a better chance of running them at stock speed, timings and voltages without having to go through endless trial and error getting them to run right with every DIMM slot populated.

[mrcmtl]

I think it all depends on whether you want to take the risk of having 4 sticks on your motherboard. When I was shopping for memory this June, I was planning to go for 4x2GB of the CL7 Flares as well, but when I saw that 2x4GB was coming, I decided to pay a bit more and be guaranteed to run at 2000Mhz at CL8. I don't regret my decision to sacrifice a bit of performance for the 2x4GB kit and now I have room in the future to buy another of those kits and have 16GB if I ever need.

And I disagree about what your friend said about more performance by having a memory lanes populated. Sometimes it can be a lot more troublesome to run 4 sticks than 2 sticks.

[ultimatepc]

Thanks guys,
That was exactly what I was hoping to year!!
I?m going 2 x 4GB then no doubt about it!!

The Last question I have is:
Will my CPU be a bottle neck??
As my 8GB RAM will have 24GB/s throughput but my CPU throughput is only 12.4GB/s or something,..... or how does this work??

Thank you for all your help.

[mrcmtl]

Technically speaking, yes, the CPU is the bottleneck. With my X6 running DDR3-2000 with 3Ghz on the NB, i get around 11.5GB/s of bandwidth. You can achieve this by using some DDR3-1600 at CL6 or something. There's two reasons why I still decided to go for the flare series: first, all of the DDR3-1600 8GB kits I see has CL9, and the flare has CL8 at 2000, so it is "faster" to begin with. Also, I think that future CPUs will be able to take advantage of higher frequencies of RAM, mainly the Bulldozer CPU from AMD coming out next year.

[wevsspot]

Your choice of a cpu and memory is a good one. Don't worry yourself with bandwidth caps that are derived from engineering specifications and theoretical limitations that none of us at our level will ever exceed right now.

Bandwidth is important, but not near as important as total raw horsepower - which you have the bases covered on.

[GuitarPlayer]

Help

So, after doing research for about a week,Idecided to place an order on newegg.
But then after everything went through, I noticed the Gskill ram i got was for a phenon II X6..so here is the setup i bought..

Item List: Item Number: Item Description: Quantity: Price:
N82E16820231371 MEM 2Gx2|GSKILL F3-16000CL9D-4GBFLS 1 159.99
N82E16819103808 CPU AMD|PH II X4 955 AM3 RT 1 154.99
N82E16813131644 MB ASUS| CROSSHAIR IV FORMULA 890FX 1 229.99

Now i wonder..Is the computer even going to boot?
And if it does work,whats the best speed ill be able to set?..Ishould have all the parts tomorrow.

[mrcmtl]

Computer will boot for sure, but you might not be able to run it at 2000 speeds. When you first boot the PC, it automatically sets it to DDR3-1333.

[GuitarPlayer]

Oh cool..If I can have it stable on at least 1600 ill b happy..should ordered the 1090t on the first place now i guess im gonna have to wait