nForce2 Dual Channel Memory: Will Single and Double sided work together?

[Herkulese]

I have two 256mb sticks of Crucial PC-2700 DDR ram that I want to put on an EpOX 8RDA+ mobo.

One stick is double sided and the other is single sided. Well these work to get the extra performance from the Dual Channel Memory buss on the nForce2, or do they both have to be Single Sided or Double Sided?

If they need to be the same, which is better? I would think that single sided would be better, as it has less chips. Is this correct?

 

[Peter]

It's dual not duel. No shooting involved.

No, you need to have DIMMs that have identical organization. E.g. a double sided 256-MByte DIMM is actually two rows of 128 MBytes, while a single sided one is one row of 256 MBytes.

 

[Herkulese]

Peter,

Thanks for the clarification.

Which are better Single or Double sided?

I am guessing single.

 

[Killrose]

It may not even boot-up and work. Also, if you are stuck using (1) stick, don't use Slot #1 in spite of what the manual tells you. I had real stability problems when I used slot #1 with one stick. When I use #1 and #2 for dual cahnnel, no problem. Other people have reported this also.

 

[chizow]

Originally posted by: Killrose
It may not even boot-up and work. Also, if you are stuck using (1) stick, don't use Slot #1 in spite of what the manual tells you. I had real stability problems when I used slot #1 with one stick. When I use #1 and #2 for dual cahnnel, no problem. Other people have reported this also.

Not sure which board you are using, but slot 1 and 2 on every nForce2 board I've looked at or set-up is actually a single-channel configuration (slot 1 and 2 share to one memory controller).

Optimal performance probably requires identical sticks, but it is NOT required for running dual-channel on an nForce2 board. Just keep in mind that the RAM will only perform as well as the lowest part in the equation, but given the somewhat picky tendencies of the independent nForce2 memory controllers, running in dual-channel may lower performance even further. For instance, you want to run PC2700 and PC3200 together in dual-channel. If you were able to reach 185MHz FSB with just the PC2700 at Cas 2.5, you may find you are now only able to run 176MHz at Cas 2.5 stably.

If you can't run those 2 sticks in dual-channel (which I don't think will be a problem as I've run unmatched pairs with no probs), I'd go with single-channel for the time being in the form of 1 x 512MB or 2 x 256MB before you go out and buy a replacement stick for dual-channel.

Chiz

 

[Killrose]

Chizow, 8RDA, the dimm off by itself is the one that won't work with-out problems. Maybe my manual lists this improperly, but i've had the problem with 2-3 different sticks not working properly by themselves in this slot. One Origional Crucial PC2100, one Corsair XMS PC2700c2 v1.1, and I think a stick Samsung. All 256mb single sided.

The problem most notably was a lock-up in games within 2-3minutes. Moving the single stick off to either of the other two slots curred it. Using two sticks in dual channel was not a problem.

Also, I said Slot#1, not Dimm 0

 

[Herkulese]

I can exchange them ram to get identical sticks, so I still would like confirmation that the single sided is the best way to go.

 

[Killrose]

Single sided is the way to go. Especially for overclocking as there will be less chance of one of the memory chips not able to clock higher.

 

[Herkulese]

Thanks Killrose

 

[mschell]

Single side is always better as some chipsets notably the I845G only allow two double side dimm total and no double side dimm in the 3d slot.

 

[Herkulese]

mschell,

Thanks for the comfirmation,

Herkulese