Upgrading from a PC133 memory system to a DDR memory system

[john doe]

Seems to me there are too few comparisons between PC133 SDRAM memory
systems and PC2100 (DDR266) & PC2700 (DDR333) & PC3200 (DDR400) double
data rate DDR memory systems. Front side bus FSB speed using whichever
memory probably is either 133MHz, 166MHz, or 200MHz.

Getting to the point.

Old system:
MSI K7 Turbo 2 (MS-6330) mainboard, no DDR support
Athlon XP 2400+ 2.0GHz 266FSB CPU
512MB PC133 CL 3 (256MB x 2)
GeForce3 AGP 4x 64 MB DDR (PVT20A-MA)
Windows XP SP1a

New system:
MSI K7N2 Delta2-LSR (MS-6570E-030) mainboard up to 400MHz DDR support
Athlon XP 2400+ 2.0GHz 266FSB CPU (same as above)
512MB DDR400 PC3200 CL 2.5 (set to match CPU rate)
GeForce3 AGP 4x 64 MB DDR (PVT20A-MA)
Windows XP SP1a

I will use whichever benchmark(s) I can find, suggestions are welcome.
Predictions are welcome as well. Results will be posted in a follow-up
message. My apologies in advance if anything goes wrong/unexpected.

 

[Spajky]

Seems to me there are too few comparisons between PC133 SDRAM memory
systems and PC2100 (DDR266) & PC2700 (DDR333) & PC3200 (DDR400) double
data rate DDR memory systems. Front side bus FSB speed using whichever
memory probably is either 133MHz...

Old system:
MSI K7 Turbo 2 (MS-6330) mainboard, no DDR support
Athlon XP 2400+ 2.0GHz 266FSB CPU

512MB PC133 CL 3 (256MB x 2)

New system:
MSI K7N2 Delta2-LSR (MS-6570E-030) mainboard up to 400MHz DDR support
Athlon XP 2400+ 2.0GHz 266FSB CPU (same as above)

I will use whichever benchmark(s) I can find, suggestions are welcome.
Predictions are welcome as well.

in real life, there is a very little noticeable difference between
PC133 Sdram & same clock/latency/capacity DDR module used on similar
sistem on same real Fsb (133MHz) /around 10%/, so you should not see
any significant performance boost!

[ All other is just a marketing blurb, but fortunately for you, DDR is
now cheaper than Sdram /sell-buy operation if changing MoBo too/. So
if you plan to OC higher than 133MHz real Fsb (266MHz DDR), your way
is to change MoBo, sell Sdram & buy DDR, since is very expensive &
hard getting PC150cas2 Sdram! ]

about benching: do not trust simple results (in MB/s) some progs gave,
since they are mostly max bandwith oriented (like Sandra), since that
max speed is practically almost never achieved ! (but gives nice
numbers (almost doubled speed for DDR against Sdram- good for
marketing purposes!).

To get quite good /no bench is perfect!/ "real" life comparision about
different mem subsistems use:
WinRAR 3.3 /there is somewhere on menu mem speed test/
http://www.rarlab.com/ & you will get result in points.
The difference in points between the sistems will tell you the
practical % difference in speed (the algorithm IMHO uses most common
applications used in average)

With my sistem @ 135Fsb/sdram I get 315 points (to be once faster in
real life needs 630 !) ... since now I´ve seen results lower than 600
(more than 550 with Athlon64+DDR overclocked, - integrated
mem.controller (rocks!) & on socket 7xx pin MoBo ...

 

[jpsga]

Seems to me there are too few comparisons between PC133 SDRAM memory
systems and PC2100 (DDR266) & PC2700 (DDR333) & PC3200 (DDR400) double
data rate DDR memory systems. Front side bus FSB speed using whichever
memory probably is either 133MHz, 166MHz, or 200MHz.

Getting to the point.

Old system:
MSI K7 Turbo 2 (MS-6330) mainboard, no DDR support
Athlon XP 2400+ 2.0GHz 266FSB CPU
512MB PC133 CL 3 (256MB x 2)
GeForce3 AGP 4x 64 MB DDR (PVT20A-MA)
Windows XP SP1a

New system:
MSI K7N2 Delta2-LSR (MS-6570E-030) mainboard up to 400MHz DDR support
Athlon XP 2400+ 2.0GHz 266FSB CPU (same as above)
512MB DDR400 PC3200 CL 2.5 (set to match CPU rate)
GeForce3 AGP 4x 64 MB DDR (PVT20A-MA)
Windows XP SP1a

I will use whichever benchmark(s) I can find, suggestions are welcome.
Predictions are welcome as well. Results will be posted in a follow-up
message. My apologies in advance if anything goes wrong/unexpected.

In the MSI K7 you were using a FSB speed of 133mHz. The 2400+ is capable of
running up to 266mHz

With the new board the FSB will run at 266mHz and you should see about a 50%
increase in memory bandwidth .

This using Sandra to BM.

JPS

 

[john doe]

I wrote:



About upgrading from a PC133 memory system to a DDR memory system, what
speed increase?

Old system:

MSI K7 Turbo 2 (MS-6330) mainboard, no DDR support

Athlon XP 2400+ 2.0GHz 266FSB CPU

512MB PC133 CL 3 (256MB x 2)

GeForce3 AGP 4x 64 MB DDR (PVT20A-MA)

Windows XP SP1a


New system:

MSI K7N2 Delta2-LSR (MS-6570E-030) mainboard up to 400MHz DDR support

Athlon XP 2400+ 2.0GHz 266FSB CPU (same as above)

512MB DDR400 PC3200 CL 2.5 (set to match CPU rate)

GeForce3 AGP 4x 64 MB DDR (PVT20A-MA)

Windows XP SP1a

I used the provided benchmark suggestions plus 3DMark03. Thanks to the reply
authors for the predictions too.





In summary.



Remarkable improvement apparently coming from memory related operations. I
can see and feel the difference.





In some detail.



With CPU and memory at 266 (2x133FSB) unless noted.



WinRar 3.4

162 KB per second (old system)

252 KB per second (new system) memory at (2x133)

235 KB per second (new system) memory at (2x200)



Sandra

CPU arithmetic 11,350 (old system) ... no change

CPU multimedia 38,641 (old system) ... no change

memory bandwidth 1,800 (old system) (new system) 3,869

file system benchmark (old system) 40,654... no change



3Dmark03

1134 3D marks (old system)

1231 3D marks (new system)

Not much total difference indicated, but new system frame rates were over
200% better.









--

FWIW. the new system is a different animal. Glad to see MSI continue/improve
on their monitoring/manipulating setup for voltage levels, temperatures, and
fan speeds. I do not overclock, but those settings are useful for other
things too.