Ddr

Scruff

Do Durons get any benefit out of using DDR instead of SDR ram or is it only the athlons with the faster fsb that do?

Gerry

The duron would gain just as much as the tbird, in my opinion. A low end duron like a 600 would not benefit so much perhaps, but consider a duron 950 or 1ghz.

The duron has much reduced l2 cache (64k), so it needs to hit main memory much more, because it cannot hold that much data in the cache.

Also, on a 100mhz bus, it is a little restricted, so a doubling of theoretical bandwidth is much appreciated.

marauder

Finally.....

http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1006-200-8146118.html?tag=mn_hd

leeroybrown

All we need now is a P4 that can compete wih the Athlon on performance and price.

Almost any system would benefit from extra memory bandwidth and lower memory latency. The faster the chip the more benefit it gets from being able to clock data in and out of RAM faster.

Doubling anything is generally a good improvement and memory speed is no different.


And considering that the prices are pretty much equivalent of those of SDRAM now its well worth chosing DDR. All you will have to do is chose the right DDR motherboard (Which might be slightly more expensive) and you have a fare more upgradeable system than a SDRAM System.

Remember to buy your RAM soon too as prices are beginning to cycle upwards again.

marauder

that would be this then......




http://www.amddiyoc.com/giga/GA-8ITXR/8ITXR-2.htm

Scruff

Resurecting an old thread, i know.

which would have better performance on a machine with Win98SE:
512Mb sdram or 256mb ddr?

i know the ddr has higher bandwidth but would double the actuall memory not help?

Saruman

Only way to answer that one scruff i think is to test it! Im sure it will depend on what else is in the system and the result for different apps/games would be different.

leeroybrown

The DDR would perform better until the RAM used by apps + OS started to get close to the 256 Megs. Then the system would have to swap to make space in RAM for new processes. All that swapping from the pagefile on the HDD to RAM and Vice Versa would really slow things down (Not to mention the sound of the HDD accesses winding you up while you wait). The 512 Meg DDR would probably not have to swap but the system performance would be bottle-necked by the lower core bandwidth.

It really does depend on how much RAM the apps you intend to run will take up. If you pass the 256 Meg level regularly the swapping would probably get annoying.

Just buy 512 PC2100 DDR. You get the best of both worlds. The only difference si that you might have to get a bit more cash for a good DDR Mobo.

Scruff

Originally posted by leeroybrown

Just buy 512 PC2100 DDR. You get the best of both worlds. The only difference si that you might have to get a bit more cash for a good DDR Mobo.

512mb ddr = € 220+

was thinking about buying an elite K75SA, £50. cheap, supports sdram or ddr ram, can take durons to xp's and onboard lan.

i'm thinking of building a fairly low budget machine with decent but not spectacular performance, something to replace my aging celeron 500 pc, so i don't want to break the bank.

i have the 512mb pc133 sdram already.

strat

for an OS like win 98 i would take the 512 ram as its smelly poo at alocating ram efficently

for xp/2k i would take the 256 ddr any day
i use 512 ddr on XP and until i loaded the core into the ram i have only seen it over 50% load once