X61 Ram Speed? 667/800

ok i looked around all over for this, and on this forum the guy says that you can put DDR2 800(PC2-6400) ram into an X61, i know the desktop 965 chipset supports that ram speed but i couldnt find out whether the mobile one does or not.
im wondering because the X61 has dedicated x3100 graphics and ram speed makes a huge difference in its performance

EDIT: crucial.com says that PC6400 ram does indeed fit the X61, my question then is does someone have benchmarks comparing the x3100 performance with pc5300 vs pc6400 ram speed (im guessing the difference is significant) because im thinking of buying faster ram for it, thanks!

p.s.: did anyone's x61 come with PC6400 ram standard??

 

Their is no difference, because the Crestline chipset does not support 800MHz RAM. It will downclock it to 667MHz.

 

Santa Rosa platform does not support PC6400 800Mhz, it supports PC5300/5400 667Mhz RAM. I have heard you can put it in but it will downclock to 667Mhz. Running the same size sticks will increase your bandwidth a little. Here is a link on RAM Link

 

damn that sucks i already found a great deal on 1GB of DDR2800 ram ( only $35!, im sure that would have made the x3100 substantially faster

 

Are you sure it was 200pin mobile RAM?

 

yep newegg.com dirt cheap and large selection

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...2000260381+1309221140&name=DDR2+800+(PC2+6400)

listen i read the ram sticky, and i have a new question, i have 1GB and 512MB sticks in mine, shouldnt that then be a problem according to that article, aka i should have 2 1GB sticks for better performance? (how big of a hit am i looking at from running different sized sticks? 5%?)

ok i found on another forum that crucial was basically selling useless ram to people (aka it clocked down to 667) and they got alot of complaints about it....and....their still doing it so yeaaa no DDR2-800

 

The performance hit is not large, about 5% sounds right.

 

wow 5% is alot lol, what if i took the 512mb stick out and left the 1Gb stick? all i play is CS:Source with nothing running in the background, and on my desktop pc i only have 1gb and it ran flawless (although it has dedicated graphics)

 

Quantity will always beat the dual-channel benefit, so taking out your 512mb stick would only slow the system down overall.

 

I may not be reading you right but if I am. Running 1 stick is the worst. On Intel Maybe 10% less vs the same size sticks. Also a 1GB + 512MB is closer to 3% less vs same size sticks. But as said more is better most of the time. I think you are running Vista w/IGP so minimum 2GB but with a IGP I think 3GB is a good choice 1GB + 2GB I would want the extra RAM and would not care about 3% less bandwidth vs 2X1GB. Going to the pagefile kills performance. If XP 2X1GB should work fine but either is fine. Also that sticky is still trying to figure out if real world 1GB +2GB is always better than 2X1GB, it just may be.

 

im running XP Pro SP2, so 1gb isnt bad, but why is 1 stick the worst i dont understand that, i used a 1gb stick on my desktop for a year, does ddr ram have to be run in pairs for optimal performance?

 

To get the Dual-Channel benefit, there physically has to be two "channels", i.e. two sticks of RAM. Think of it like two hard drives in RAID 0 (though the performance increase is nowhere near what RAID gives). 1+512 will still be able to do asynchronous dual channel, but a single stick won't be able to do dual channel at all. If you want to upgrade, replace your 512mb stick with a 1GB or 2GB SODIMM.

 

Dual Channel won't make any difference.

The 5% difference is only detectable in benchmarks.
In the real world you usually won't see any improvements at all, maybe 1-3 % at most (best case scenario).

 

so then, nothing at all i can do to make the graphics performance on the x61 better ?

 

Not really, no. It will get better with more RAM, I'd recommend either 1GB+1GB or 2GB+1GB, and it will get better as the x3100 drivers improve.