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From: car crash on 26 Jan 2008 16:33
I have a Asus P5B-VM mainboard. 2 days ago it started freezing up
right on startup and nothing would work. A friend came over and after
3 hours of work realized there might be a RAM issue. I have 2 1 gig
dimms of Rendition RAM and 2 512 megs of Patriot Value RAM. He
thought that the different Rams were messing everything up. He took
out one of the rams and it started working again. Right now I'm using
the 2 1 gig dimms of ram for a total of 2 gigs of ram and it seems ok
now.

My question is, does anyone know why 2 different RAms will mess a
computer up ? Can Ram be mixed and matched ? Which is better ram the
Rendtion Ram or the Patriot Value RAm ? Can the Asus mainboard take
both types of ram ?

Thanks all.

From: RobV on 26 Jan 2008 17:44
car crash wrote:
> I have a Asus P5B-VM mainboard. 2 days ago it started freezing up
> right on startup and nothing would work. A friend came over and after
> 3 hours of work realized there might be a RAM issue. I have 2 1 gig
> dimms of Rendition RAM and 2 512 megs of Patriot Value RAM. He
> thought that the different Rams were messing everything up. He took
> out one of the rams and it started working again. Right now I'm using
> the 2 1 gig dimms of ram for a total of 2 gigs of ram and it seems ok
> now.
>
> My question is, does anyone know why 2 different RAms will mess a
> computer up ? Can Ram be mixed and matched ? Which is better ram the
> Rendtion Ram or the Patriot Value RAm ? Can the Asus mainboard take
> both types of ram ?
>
> Thanks all.

First, the MB uses dual channel technology, which gives more bandwidth
when using a matched pair of memory. Mixing brands of RAM is not
something that contributes to stability and usually causes problems as
you are discovering.

Do both pairs have the same memory specs, SPD settings (timings),
voltage needed for stable operation? Probably not.

Use the two 1 GB sticks of RAM, as the system will then be stable (don't
forget to set timings and voltage according to spec for that memory).
Whatever you're doing with the system, you would have a hard time using
even close to 2 GB anyway.


From: Sudsy on 27 Jan 2008 06:38
On Jan 26, 5:44 pm, "RobV" <r...(a)nowhere.invalid> wrote:
<snip>
> Use the two 1 GB sticks of RAM, as the system will then be stable (don't
> forget to set timings and voltage according to spec for that memory).
> Whatever you're doing with the system, you would have a hard time using
> even close to 2 GB anyway.

Mixing single channel and dual channel is going to give you a
performance hit.
I had problems with my M2A-VM HDMI when I added two 1G sticks
(different
manufacturer) to my initial 2G configuration but upgrading the BIOS to
version
1501 solved the difficulties I was encountering. So mixing RAM
shouldn't be a
problem as long as the speed and timings are compatible.
As to the comment about memory utilization, have you seen the size of
the
SGA required to run even one instance of Oracle? If you run two or
more (I
do) then 2GB doesn't provide enough overhead, hence my move to 4GB. As
always, it depends on what you're doing with your system. You
shouldn't be
generalizing and suggesting that "you would have a hard time using
even
close to 2GB". YMMV.
From: RobV on 27 Jan 2008 17:02
Sudsy wrote:
> On Jan 26, 5:44 pm, "RobV" <r...(a)nowhere.invalid> wrote:
> <snip>
>> Use the two 1 GB sticks of RAM, as the system will then be stable
>> (don't forget to set timings and voltage according to spec for that
>> memory). Whatever you're doing with the system, you would have a
>> hard time using even close to 2 GB anyway.
>
> Mixing single channel and dual channel is going to give you a
> performance hit.
> I had problems with my M2A-VM HDMI when I added two 1G sticks
> (different
> manufacturer) to my initial 2G configuration but upgrading the BIOS to
> version
> 1501 solved the difficulties I was encountering. So mixing RAM
> shouldn't be a
> problem as long as the speed and timings are compatible.
> As to the comment about memory utilization, have you seen the size of
> the
> SGA required to run even one instance of Oracle? If you run two or
> more (I
> do) then 2GB doesn't provide enough overhead, hence my move to 4GB. As
> always, it depends on what you're doing with your system. You
> shouldn't be
> generalizing and suggesting that "you would have a hard time using
> even
> close to 2GB". YMMV.

Using a P5B-VM MB, I doubt that the OP will need more than 2 GB. Sure,
there are applications that could use as much memory as you can feed it,
but most of those aren't run on a P5B-VM MB.
http://www.asus.com/products.aspx?l1=3&l2=11&l3=332&l4=0&model=1312&modelmenu=2

Therefore, the OP, whom the comment was directed towards, would probably
have a hard time using 2 GB memory. Perhaps I should have used the word
"probably" in the first response, just for your peace of mind.


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