Dual Channel or More Memory

[kevinturcotte]

My motherboard supports dual channel memory, and I had, until last week, 4 sticks of 512 MB DDR3200 RAM installed. One of them died, and at the moment I have just 2 sticks installed. I know if I reinstall the 3rd stick, I'll lose Dual Channel benefits, but does the 512 MB boost warrant the loss?
I don't really care to spend money on a new stick, as I plan on upgrading the motherboard later this year to support a newer processor, and DDR2 or DDR3 RAM.

[funhouse69]

The answer is it depends on your motherboard and how the memory controller accesses the memory. I would say that it will work however you will see the system slow down a little. Honestly I don't think that it will be a huge difference.

Some systems require you to put sticks in pairs and if yours is one of them then it won't boot up. I haven't run in to many of them lately though

Can't hurt - try it and see what you think about the performance. While I haven't looked at the price of that specific memory I can't imagine that it would be anywhere near expensive, ok I did a quick search on Newegg.com and its $23.00 for what its worth.

[kevinturcotte]

I installed it. Not sure how much stock I put in it, but I'm running Vista, and my Windows Experience Index went from 4.5 to 4.1 lol Seems to be a little speedier though.