DDR4 and Z170 question

[dbratton54]

I've been trying to answer a few questions here and now I have one.

I recently built a Skylake rig - i5 6600K on a Gigbyte Z170x Gaming 5 mobo with 16GB DDR4 RAM.

I used an 2x8 RAM kit. Everything is working just fine, but I wonder about using 2x8 as opposed to 4x4 RAM kit. Did I lose any performance by not filling all four RAM slots?

 

[Gam3r01]

No, skylake does not support quad channel memory. You allowed for a future upgrade though.

 

[Poozle]

Read gam3r01 and there is your answer. Quad channel doesnt add much benefit tbh. The X99 platform does support quad channel if you were wondering about what did. 16gb is more than enough for now to a while longer. Science Studio did a test with 4 vs 8 vs 16gb of ram in games. Surprising results. See link.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iKIavpEQQGg

 

[Tradesman1]

You went the right way, 2x8GB gives you dual and is less stress on the MC (memory controller) than going for 4x4 (which would still be simply dual channel). Always best to utilize full channel capabilities (here dual is max) with as few sticks as possible. Only use all the slots if running max DRAM the mobo can handle