Single Ch. 768 vs. Dual Ch. 512 ?

  • Thread starter Thread starter QZ
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Q

QZ

I bought parts for a budget second PC, and I went with a Intel 848 chipset
board with Single Channel capability, and I got one 512mb memory module.

The next board up, with Intel 865 and Dual Channel was $30 more. So, I could
have had 512mb Dual Ch.
(Like all the parts, I could have gotten more, but on a budget I had to make
decisions.)

So, now I have this Mainboard, and for $32, I can add 256mb to end up with
768mb Single Ch.

So, for virtually the same $, I wonder how does 768mb Single Ch. compare to
512 Dual Ch.?
Has this comparision ever been benchmarked?

Thanks,
QZ
 
QZ said:
I bought parts for a budget second PC, and I went with a Intel 848 chipset
board with Single Channel capability, and I got one 512mb memory module.

The next board up, with Intel 865 and Dual Channel was $30 more. So, I could
have had 512mb Dual Ch.
(Like all the parts, I could have gotten more, but on a budget I had to make
decisions.)

So, now I have this Mainboard, and for $32, I can add 256mb to end up with
768mb Single Ch.

So, for virtually the same $, I wonder how does 768mb Single Ch. compare to
512 Dual Ch.?
Has this comparision ever been benchmarked?

This PC is mainly for broadband web-browsing, sometimes with many windows
open for product comparisions.

I would also like to know what the gain is going from 512 to 768mb?
 
This PC is mainly for broadband web-browsing, sometimes with many windows
open for product comparisions.

I would also like to know what the gain is going from 512 to 768mb?

That would depend on how much memory you actually use.

If you aren't using more than 512, the extra memory isn't going to help
much. If you are using more than 512, swapping to disk is way slower than
the difference between the RAM types.
 
I bought parts for a budget second PC, and I went with a Intel 848 chipset
board with Single Channel capability, and I got one 512mb memory module.

The next board up, with Intel 865 and Dual Channel was $30 more. So, I could
have had 512mb Dual Ch.
(Like all the parts, I could have gotten more, but on a budget I had to make
decisions.)

So, now I have this Mainboard, and for $32, I can add 256mb to end up with
768mb Single Ch.

So, for virtually the same $, I wonder how does 768mb Single Ch. compare to
512 Dual Ch.?
Has this comparision ever been benchmarked?

The following article compares an i848P based board to an i865PE board
and three i875 boards:

http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=1865

The long story short is that the i848P does pretty well in most tests
except for the high-end workstation tests. For everything else is
actually pretty much a tie between the i848P and the i865PE chipset,
or at least close enough that you'll never notice.

Now, that being said, the above tests do show that there are obvious
exceptions to the above. The high-end workstation tests (SPEC
viewperf 7.0 suite) shows that the i848P was consistently outperformed
on all tests by the i865PE, sometimes by more than 10%.

Now, this isn't exactly the comparison you were after since they are
comparing 512MB vs. 512MB, however it should give you a decent
baseline. Basically the difference between 768MB and 512MB is
absolutely nothing until you actually start USING more than 512MB, and
that doesn't happen for most applications that people are likely to
run on a budget second PC.

So, umm, I guess I haven't really answered your question yet, and
that's because I can't really give a definitive answer without testing
the specific applications. However one thing I can suggest is that
the chances of you noticing the difference one way or the other is
pretty darn slim.
 
Tony Hill said:
The following article compares an i848P based board to an i865PE board
and three i875 boards:

http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=1865

The long story short is that the i848P does pretty well in most tests
except for the high-end workstation tests. For everything else is
actually pretty much a tie between the i848P and the i865PE chipset,
or at least close enough that you'll never notice.
However one thing I can suggest is that
the chances of you noticing the difference one way or the other is
pretty darn slim.

I appreciate the detailed response.
So, if the system resources need more memory, I can just get the extra
256mb to make 768mb, and it will be faster than 512mb of Dual-Channel. Is
that correct?
 
I appreciate the detailed response.
So, if the system resources need more memory, I can just get the extra
256mb to make 768mb, and it will be faster than 512mb of Dual-Channel. Is
that correct?

Simple answer - yes :)
 
Simple answer - yes :)

Don't you just love all these simple answers!

Now wait for it, BUT!

Are you a gamer and need better low latency!

Does running in Dual Channel mode float your boat!

Does the extra memory make a better benefit than Dual Channel!

Ok I agree in most cases its yes, put why not just buy another stick, and
have the benefits of both.

Gnu_Raiz
 
Gnu_Raiz said:
Are you a gamer and need better low latency!
No.

Does running in Dual Channel mode float your boat!

Can't, because I don't have a Dual Channel board. (I guess you haven't been
following this thread.)
Does the extra memory make a better benefit than Dual Channel!

Apparently, yes.
Ok I agree in most cases its yes, put why not just buy another stick, and
have the benefits of both.

See answer #2.
 
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