03-01-2003 13:14									#1
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I need a new motherboard, and my hours of painstaking research has come to a bit of a dead end...

I've currently got 768MB of SDRAM, but the majority of P4 mobos (and all the mobos that support FSB533) only support DDR-SDRAM.

So the big question is should I dump all my current SDRAM and spend £110 ($170) on 512MB of DDR RAM, or keep my current RAM but buy a mobo with a shorter lifespan and slower RAM?
A key factor is how my 768MB SDRAM would perform compared to 512MB DDR-RAM. I haven't got a clue.

Please help!

	03-01-2003 13:25									#2
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I'm running 2 gigs DDR-RAM and no swapfile under WinXP, and it kicks major ass over my old (also on a P4) 1 gig of SDRAM.

RAM speed and quantity are not related - the whole issue is whether you'll get close enough to the RAM limits with what you do to hit swapfile, or not. If you're running WinXP Pro, I found 512 MB to be minimal, but I tend to have lots of open windows and be doing stuff. The performance gain from equal amounts of DDR SDRAM was noticeable on most apps, but not earthshattering. For large photoshop and video editing, mid-size databases, and lots of background stuff, the difference between 512 MB and 1 gig was more noticeable, and the difference between 1 and 2 less dramatic, but still notable, especially once I turned the swapfile off (Win XP tends to run a lot of false swapfile hits when there's still lots of physical RAM available.)

	03-01-2003 13:37									#3
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Thanks for the advice MtG but I'd still beg a little more...

When it comes down to it would you choose between 768MB SDRAM and 512MB DDRRAM? More and slower or less and faster?

I run Win2k and tend to do lots of background work, lots of sound, image and video editing, little 3D gaming.

	03-01-2003 13:39									#4
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In my opinion it would be tough to see a difference between those configurations...the difference will probably be negligible.

	03-01-2003 13:42									#5
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quote: the difference will probably be negligible.

That's the answer I want to hear as it'll save me a lot of money in new RAM!

	03-01-2003 13:45									#6
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If you're doing significant background work in NT anything, I would expect you'd find a slight but noticeable deterioration in the overall performance of the 512 DDR version, due to extra swapfile hits and I/O.

	03-01-2003 13:46									#7
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Yeah save your cash if you can.

I have seen some motherboards that will accept both DDR and SDRAM, by the way. Now I'm not sure that it will take the RAM *at the same time* but I have seen boards that have slots for both type or RAM.

	03-01-2003 13:56									#8
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Thanks for the help MtG and Ted... I think my mind is made up to stick with the RAM I have... more money for a better CPU

quote: I have seen some motherboards that will accept both DDR and SDRAM, by the way. Now I'm not sure that it will take the RAM *at the same time* but I have seen boards that have slots for both type or RAM.

Good lord be this the holy grail spoken of in myth??!?
I'd be very curious to hear who makes this. I've done lots of looking and seen none that can make this boast. At least I could borrow some RAM from a friend and do a benchmark test this way.

But either way, in case anyone would care to make any suggestions on alternate systems, here is what I plan to buy:

Gigabyte 8ID533 mobo (£65)
WD 80GB 8Mb cache HDD (£100)
P4 2.0GHz 512Kb cahce (£125)

+ use my existing graphics card and RAM. Not a bad improvement for £290 over my P3 600MHz and 2x20 GB HDD!

	03-01-2003 13:59									#9
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There are several - most of the current computers in the office where I do consulting work have these, running 2 gig P4's as their standard desktop boxes.

You can't (with any of them) and won't ever be able to run both types installed at the same time, it's an either/or solution.

	03-01-2003 14:07									#10
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MtG, any idea on the manufacturer of these mobos?

I can handle not being able to run both RAM types at the same time, it just gives me a couple of months to space the upgrade over. I'd especially like it if the mobo you're talking about supports FSB533 as I'd like to upgrade to some better than P4 2.4 in the next few months...

	03-01-2003 15:51									#11
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Isn't the speed of you SDRAM also a factor, PC100 PC133 PC210 etc?

Does the clockspeed of the motherboard constrain you from using slower SDRAM dimms?

..In my case (a very old K6-2 380) I have 380 Mb of SDRAM all running at 100Mgz, although the 256Mb dimm is PC133.

..just a thought.

	03-01-2003 17:09									#12
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I don't know of any P4 boards that support both SDR adn DDR... I know the SIS 735 chipset boards do that for Athlon.

So maybe you want to switch to Athlon, but still there are only two slots, so if you have three RIMMS you will be able to use 512 MB. If you have two. 512 and 256 than you will be able to use all 768 MB on those mobos. The ECS K7S5A (or something like that) is such a board and you can only use DDR266 with it, still Athlons do not benefit much more from DDR333 ( the current 266 FSB ones).

Anyway this is one of the cheapest boards around too. ~£45 in UK. It is fairly old and reliable... many have been sold.

Futrhermore for P4... the perf difference with SDR vs DDR will be more than 10% for sure, and with the current over 2 ghz northwood models that you are looking for even more. It was over 10% with the old vilamette P4's. (up to 2 ghz and 256 kb L2cache).
P4's thrive on bandwith. However Athlon XP's won't take such a hit with SDR.

I don't think this was what you wanted to hear, but here it is ...

an example http://www.tech-report.com/reviews/...d7/index.x?pg=3
here in content creation - that is photoshop and such the difference between P4 SDR and P4 DDR333 (single channel) with everything else being equal ~12%.

Check that review.. you are interested in Intel 845 chipset that was P4 with SDR. You can see that it is significantly slower than everything else.