Why I buy Crucial Ram

[Bubba]

http://www.tweakersasylum.com/Reviews/CrucialPC133/Crucial133.html

And not to mention it's only $77 for the stick tested in this review and free shipping.

 

[yoda271828]

Crucial is definitely good stuff. I would only buy Crucial or Mushkin. I want to know how Crucial and Mushkin stack up to one another. I wish someone would do a good review of the two. I've seen many reviews of them individually, but never head to head.

 

[Bubba]

I think I saw a review that puts the two against each other, but I can't remember where. I think Mushkin was faster and better for overclocking. I went with Crucial because it had a better price and I don't overclock my ram.

 

[Kodiak]

>> Crucial is definitely good stuff.

we're all starting to sound like drug addicts

 

[Kodiak]

more RAM... I NEED more RAM dude!

 

[Bandit]

I just installed 256 megs of Infineon stuff (see post further down).

I am running a KT7-Raid, w/ Duron 750. I have the memory set to fast (it's cas 3, 7.5ns) not turbo, and my bus speed left alone. I marked in Sandra ALU 439, FPU 516. That's almost up there with the crucial stuff at CAS 2. And like I said, I haven't tweaked it as much as I could yet.

Right now my CAS 3 7.5ns infineon memory with almost the same setup as the linked test runs just under 1% slower. If I can squeez another few percentage points out of it, it will beat the crucial ram which is cas 2.

<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by Bandit on 12/19/00 04:25 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[Bubba]

Alright, you showed my yours, now I'll show you mine.
Asus A7V
Duron 600@950
256MB PC133 Cas2 Crucial (7ns)
Sandra 2001
ALU 429
FPU 526
I have no idea what these numbers mean.

 

[Bandit]

Well, I worked on it, and tweaked some more.

ABIT KT7-Raid
Duron 750@750
256MB PC133 Cas3 Infineon (7.5ns) running at Turbo
Sandra 2001
ALU 445
FPU 528

The numbers are apparently transfer rate in MB/s

This is interesting to me. We hear a lot about Crucial, and Muskin, but I have never heard of Infineon ram before. The only benchmarks I could find online were for OEM SDRAM modules using the Infineon chips. It seems to me that we have ANOTHER brand name of ram out there that really posts some impressive numbers. If the infineon CAS 3 7.5ns is beating your crucial CAS 2 7.0ns, I would be very interested to see the tests on CAS 2 7.0ns Infineon ram.

And like I posted in another thread, I got this stuff for 130 US (2 x 128MB sticks). Which is 65 for 128. AND I bought it from a local computer store here in canada. I am sure you could find it for a few dollars cheaper online.

 

[Guest]

FYI, Infineon either was Siemans or is affiliated with, etc., Siemans. If you look at the RAM on just about any DDR video card, you'll see that it's Infineon...or at least that was true several months ago.

Mike

 

[Bubba]

How are you tweaking? How are you making your ram go faster? My scores are just what I get when running Sandra, I have no idea how to tweak my ram.

 

[Bandit]

Well, basically, in the KT7 bios there is the option for setting your ram speed. I set mine at Turbo which (I think) is 7.0ns CAS2.. And the system is rock solid. Then there are a few options like force 4 way interleave and the like.

I really don't know a whole lot about memory. I found a page of tweaks for my MB Bios, and followed the instructions.

 

[Bubba]

Well, I have the A7V and there is a place to set my ram to 222 and 143 and 7ns but that is what they are now. The board autodetected my ram and made those the settings. I guess I can't do much more.
Anyway, I was just playing American McGee's Alice. I do notice a loading time difference. 256mb makes me wait a lot less than just 128mb on WinMe.
I am quite happy with my system right now.

 

[Bandit]

Tell me about it!

I am running Windows 2000 professional, and When I load quake 3, after the initial load, the hard drive hardly flickers while changing levels. Also, when I close it, check mail, and open it again, the WHOLE game is in cache! Takes 3 seconds from clicking on the game to playing!

I know the benchmarks might say 256 isn't much faster than 128. But this is a prime example of how little benchmarks really take into account.

Bandit - Huh? Sandra doesn't play quake 3???

 

[Dravic]

since we are all whiping them out.. hehe

ALU=530
FPU=631

mushkin infineon pc133 @ 149 cas2

all mem specs maxed including 4 way interleaving..


as a side note, i only had 128mb until i upgraded to win2k. I order the second 128 just about a week ago, and that mushkin infineon pc133 was just as good. Now I'm at 256mb 149 cas2. ONLY $79..

Abit KT7 RAID
Duron 650@896
128MB pc133@149cas2
Geforce2mx(205/215)
Antect s1030/sblive+

 

[Bandit]

Dang.. Mushkin Infineon.....

HOW DID YOU GET YOUR DURON TO OC!!! Argh.. NM.. Not the right forum. I seriously think you are all teasing me. I put so much H4 lead on those bridges I think I gave myself lead poisoning. :/

 

[Bubba]

Here is another article on my ram.
http://www.templeoftech.com/articles.cfm?ArticleID=46&PageID=1

And here is a question for you guys.
Are you guys overclocking? And if so, are you using the mlutipliers (jumpers) or increasing the FSB or both?
I was thinking of lowering my multiplier and increasing my FSB. As best I can tell from this article, this would make my ram go faster.
Would it make other components like my video card go faster as well?

 

[Bandit]

I just OC'd my processor from 750 to 950. I also changed my ram setting in the BIOS to run it at Turbo (7.0ns Cas 2) but I DID leave the cas setting at 3. My Sisoft benchmark for memory increased as follows.

Infineon PC133 7.5ns Cas 3

---------|Duron@750-|-(turbo)-|-Duron@950
Int ALU--|----439----|---445---|----455----
Float FPU|----516----|---538---|----548----

The results @ 950 are using both the turbo setting and the clock multiplier. I haven't tried OCing the FSB, but I have a post asking about it in the CPU section.

 

[phsstpok]

Here are some of my overclocking results. I have a 600 Mhz Duron, an Abit KT7 motherboard, OCZ memory (7.5 ns - Infineon and/or Micron chips). My memory timing settings are kept at FAST as opposed to TURBO.

---------|900Mhz CAS2|1Ghz CAS3|1Ghz CAS2|1007Mhz CAS2 *
Int ALU--|----420----|---427---|---421---|----452-----
Float FPU|----518----|---505---|---529---|----555-----

* 106 Mhz FSB X 9.5, RAM @ 141 Mhz

 

[Crashman]

I have seen several publications refering to 10,8, and 7ns SDRAM as being 70, 60, and 50ns. And these are recent articles. Is this a division game? Just curious-I use 1 128MB Crucial Cas2 133.