Which Ram? Crucial or OCZ?

I am about to order 2x1GB PC2-5400 ram, all same specifications and everything and at the same shop
I'm don't know which ram company is more better/reputable/reliable.
OCZ is cheaper than Crucial by $1 at $32 a piece.

Or should I get the one that I can get the fastest?

Thanks

 

I would go with OCZ. $2 = Big Mac.

 

Yep, get the cheaper memory. Both are good companies, and as long as the memory has a lifetime warranty, you're golden.

 

Brand means nothing besides the warrenty may very between brands. Its just the IC's that matter. If your really concerned you would find out what IC's each one uses in that model and get the better.

Otherwise it may as well be the same.

 

IC? what's IC?

 

OCZ ftw!!!

 

XFD! This post is epic. Listen to this guy.

 

IC - internal circuts. What the ram is made with. These ram companies buy IC's in mass and just label them with there name and test them. They often change IC's depending on whats avalible or what model of ram your buying.

if OCZ and Mushkin for instance buy the same ICs from the actual people that make the ram chips. The ram for both companies will be the same, so if one sells it 20$ less its a better deal. However its possible they are using different IC's and one is known to run better overclocks, or be more compatible, use less voltage ect ect. Then the money difference can change.

 

Hey, I live in Canada, and even though our dollar is about the same as yours, I still have to pay like $4.39 for a Big Mac Burger lol. Everything in Canada is a lot more expensive than in the States.
But thanks for the advice!

 

Both brands are great. Crucial has excellent customer service. No experience with OCZ.

 

First off, IC stands for integrated circuit. Second, not all chips are created equally, though the chips aren't usually of a huge impact. Still, I'd rather have Micron chips than Infineon, and I avoid Hynix. A lot of it is preference, but some are better than others.

But the chip really makes very little difference unless there's a known incompatibility with your motherboard. The big thing is the PCB (printed circuit board). A lot of memory manufacturers will use circuit boards which have a hell of a time isolating signals without crosstalk. You use a cheap PCB and you're asking for trouble. If you're lucky you won't be able to boot, or successfully install your OS. If you're unlucky everything will seem fine until six months down the road when you discover you can no longer boot your OS because a bunch of dll's and half of your data has been corrupted. And sure, you have a lifetime warranty but good luck getting a stick of RAM that's worth a damn from some of these places.

That said, OCZ isn't bad, but it isn't great either. Crucial is a division of Micron, a very large memory chip manufacturer. They make all of their own PCB's, and their quality control and support is excellent. Other good choices are Corsair and Kingston. Everything else ranges from hit and miss to horrible.

 

Ethyriel since you are talking about PCB quality in which category would you put memory from Transcend, A-Data and G.Skill. Hit and miss or horrible?

 

Transcend is hit and miss, but you miss rarely enough I've used it in budget builds when there's a larger spread in price. I don't trust G.Skill or A-Data at all, but that doesn't necessarily mean they haven't cleaned up their acts and I haven't caught on yet. Neither of those things are about to happen overnight.

 

Last night i picked up 2x 1gb pc5300 ddr2 Mushkin sticks for my hp. They work great! Was gonna get the OCZ' sticks from the place but they were out. Got mu mushkin sticks at Canadacomputers.com if that helps. They have various locations around toronto where i live.

 

I found some Kingston 1GB PC2-5300 on shoprbc.com for $30/piece.
How much'd you pick up yours for?

 

I have installed 2X1G Crucial PC2-5300 couple of days back and they run great, checked them with memtest86+ for around 14 hours, no problems...

The price that was quoted seems to be a bit high..., right now Buy.com has 2X1G Crucial for 60.99 - $10 (Google checkout) - $10 (MIR), which would be an awesome deal......, just $20/Gig...., check that out......

 

Now you tell me! I just ordered two sticks of G. Skill from NewEgg. Most of the reviews were high and the rep was responsive in the NewEgg review section for the few that had problems.

 

To be fair, if you're just building one machine a return isn't as much of a hassle as if you're building 15 to 20 a month and you have to return five sticks and possibly delay those machines. So as long as you don't buy really low quality generic stuff it won't be too bad, but I'd still rather have Crucial in my machine for the sake of data integrity.

 

Thanks, but unfortunately, the prices ain't the same in Canada