Question about how channel kits work

[imlost]

I am looking to upgrade my ram from 4 gigs to 8 since newegg has a good deal on a set of Gskill ram. The kit im looking at says its a quad channel kit and my motherboard only does triple. What would happen in this situation would the ram not work or would it just be downgraded to a triple kit?

 

[o1die]

You need to consult the motherboard manual; some x58 boards will run in dual channel mode by using certain ram slots in pairs. I wouldn't mix ram. Sell your old ram is your manual says the mix won't work.

 

[JackMomma]

so your board has 6 DIMM slots, which are two sets of 3 technically. if you run 3 sticks, it'll be in 3-channel mode when properly positioned, but if you ran anything other than 3 or 6 (So I assume from my previous research a while ago, as I run 3-channel RAM as well). then you won't be running in triple-channel mode...
the short answer to your question is that no, 4 sticks can't run in tri-channel mode, unless you left one out. above is suggesting that some boards can look at the 4 sticks as two sets in dual-channel mode, which is possible, but again would depend on the board.