RAM speed with Ryzen 7 2700x

[authoritah]

Hi,

I'm planning on switching to AMD Ryzen from Intel but I'm a little confused about this RAM situation.

I need a new desktop for a software that needs high processing power with as many cores as possible and doesn't depend on the speed of RAM and definitely doesn't care much for the GPU.

So I thought i'll go with a Ryzen 7 2700x and use my already existing GPU nvidia 630 GT and use 2 DIMMs of 8 GB each.

Before we get into the RAM situation I wanna specify that I do not intend on overclocking this PC at all. I need this to last me as long as possible (at least 6 years) and I live in a hot climate so heat can totally be an issue and I don't wanna get any advanced cooling, i'll just use the stock CPU cooler.

As I was reading up I learnt that the speed of your RAM affects the speed of your CPU. Ryzen 7 2700x supports 2933MHz according to it's website but I read a lot of people saying 3200MHz RAM is the best for performance with these processors.

1. Are people using 3200 RAM basically overclocking?
2. Does XMP negatively affect your processor?
3. Most motherboards like MSI B450 Tomahawk seem to be OC'ing RAM above 2667 MHz so basically using XMP profiles for 2800 MHz and above however some Gigabyte boards like Gigabyte B450 AOROUS M seem to be OC'ing only at 3200 MHz and above. What's up with that? Were most people supposed to be only using 2667 MHz RAM and is everyone else overclocking and why don't these boards support up to 2933 without OC since the processor supports 2933?
4. Finally is it even worth it to get into 3200 MHz or should I just get the Gigabyte board with 3000 MHz RAM for optimal use with the Ryzen 7 2700x that seems to support up to 2933 MHz anyway?

 

[CountMike]

Basic DDR4 frequency is 2133MHz and everything over that is overclocking so you must do some OC if you want RAM faster than that.
Luckily there are XMP (Extreme Memory Profile) built into most RAM nowadays, those are OC presets that BIOS should recognize adn set that OC automatically. Some RAM have 2 or more presets like that. In some AMD based MBs it's also called DOCP.
How high XMP/DOCP is set is up to BIOS and RAM itself.
2nd gen Ryzen has 2933MHz RAM as "Natural frequency" but can run with much higher speed. BIOS and MB permitting, above 3200MHz or 3000MHz with low latency is getting diminishing gains. Not much to be gained with RAM faster than that.
Most MBs have upgraded BIOS version, using AGESA 1006 and can accept even higher RAM frequencies.
My RAM is running just fine at 3600MHz for instance but gains against 3200 Cl4 are minimal in real life.

 

[authoritah]

Hi,

Thanks for the reply.

I'm looking at a motherboard that says this about the supported RAM. "Support for DDR4 3200(O.C.)/2933/2667/2400/2133 MHz memory modules"

https://www.gigabyte.com/Motherboard/B450-AORUS-M-rev-10#sp

Would running 3000MHz RAM use an XMP to run at 3000MHz on this board? Would I need to overclock the RAM?

 

[CountMike]

XMP is overclock.

 

[authoritah]

So on that motherboard that I posted, would I need to use an XMP with 3000MHz RAM? I ask because it says (OC) for 3200

 

[CountMike]

Yes ,set XMP to whatever is in the RAM. That way you'll get your OC.

 

[authoritah]

Will that produce a lot of heat? Will that affect the life of my CPU?

 

[CountMike]

No, it will not affect CPU and don't worry about memory heat, they are made for it and don't heat much.

 

[authoritah]

Ok, thanks.