Confused on 2GB Ram vs 3GB performance

I have a M1710 Dell running Window XP Pro with 2GB of Ram(2x1GB) . I found a great deal on a 2GB stick which puts me at 3GB. I searched but keep getting different answers. Some say the Laptop will take a performance hit because of not running dual channels while other say it doesn't matter anymore because of new technology.

I don't care about price, I'm simply trying to find out if my laptop takes a performance decrease because it won't be running dual channels with 3GB of Ram?

 

There will be a performance hit because all the RAM will not be running in dual-channel mode. But the performance hit will not be noticed by you.

You could just call it a day and order another 2GB stick. Even though you won't get more than about 3.2GB of usable RAM, then you wouldn't have to be paranoid .

 

best thing to do is just to buy two of those 2gb sticks, then you'll have4gb dual channel memory. if you want, just buy 1 2gb stick. first use passmark to check memory score on your 2gb machine. then replace a 1gb stick with a 2gb stick, and repeat the tests. compare the two memory scores. the only way i'm afraid to know which will be faster is a practical approach

 

I run 3gb in dual channel mode. Its called asymmetric dual channel and its pretty standard now. However with our without dual channel its not a big change ether way.

Pretty much how it works is it will match the largest quantity of ram it can in a 2+1gb setup it will put 2gb of ram in full dual channel mode and leave the 1gb left over in single mode, thats about as layman's as I can make it.

 

Everybody above is correct. Here is a link with way more than I think you want to know. Now to make it short and sweet, single vs dual on an Intel is about 10% on AMD (as I have been able to test) about 30%. the hit for using 3GB's is 3.33% with Intel. Not a major hit in my opinion. Anything that prevents going to "pagefile" is an improvement, even if single channel. It could be determined from experiment if it would benefit you. That said, with such a minor potential penalty, I would say go for 3GB's. It really all depends on what you do, and on XP I doubt you will see an improvement but also believe you will not see a lack of performance with 3GB's. So go for it!

 

I have Vista Home Premium 32bit with two slots loaded with 2 + 1 GB. I asked a Best Buy "Geek Squad" expert guy (who really seemed to know his stuff, unlike most of them there, based on previous high level techie questions I had asked him earlier on other issues) and he said that "oddly" going from what I had to a 2 + 2 GB balanced setup would actually be a slight downgrade, even if price were no object! He was well aware that the system would only show 3.2 GB (or so) loaded (more proof he knew his stuff), but said that for some other reason (that I can't recall, sorry) in 32 bit designs there would be a performance loss, despite the small RAM increase to max. capacity.

I walked away happy that I didn't need to buy another 2GB card and since it meant he wasn't selling me one he obviously wasn't telling a lie and really believes this ( as opposed to the other way around, in which case one could suspect a "hard sell" instead of "help the customer out" scenario).

Anyone?

 

benchmark prove otherwise

maybe he was just trying to get rid of you cause you ask too many questions lol

 

I just checked 2 guys from best buy's geek squad into the hotel! odd eh? anyways I get from many other forum post that many people have had bad experiences with the "geek squad" or the similar personal of mainstream retail electronics stores. (firedog I think for circuit city). These guys are a random bunch they may know there stuff and they may not, its a retail situation so I am sure they have alot of pressure to get as much work done as fast as possible to maximize labor and profits and that alone probably has alot to do with why quality of service can be so low.

I have tried various ram combinations in the past and tested them exclusively (including AMD and even tested 1t vs 2t on AMD) and what I found was real life performance was not changed very much if any at all. I could only find microseconds of difference in cpu test like cpuz/wprime I could never get a solid difference in figures in say 3dmark or inside a video game. The only place I ever saw the change was in a direct ram benchmark like Sandra, and those numbers are all synthetic and just didnt really amount to anything.

3gb and 4gb are going to be about the same IMO and I would just get the one that has the best deal.

 

Dual channel was the stuff back in the day of the AMD athlons. Nowadays, especially with laptops, memory performance is pretty commoditized. It is funny to see average users sweat the performance difference of dual channel memory when they should be sweating other stuff.

Useful performance tips for average users?

Email filters: I have coworkers that spend almost an hour every morning digging through email. This is pretty easy to me. You generally have a list of people who if you get Email from them, it takes priorty over EVERYTHING.
Email from my Boss, or my Boss's Boss or his boss takes priority over email from my mom.

Backups: Noobs here break the software in their computers faster than I could myself. So I've increased the frequency of backups(from incremental 24 hour to incrememntal 15 mins, ::rolls eyes: of their computers and also moved their profiles onto the server. Of course my boss threw some resistence to this move at first, but after a few painless restores of their work, this became a non issue as the restore took a few seconds time max now.

None of these tips are hardware tips because I guarentee you the biggest constraints now are user habits and not hardware.

 

I would stay away from 3GB if I were you, use 2GB or 4GB for proper dual channel mode.