1GB vs. 1.25GB

Which offers more performance: 1GB of Transcend RAM (1 stick), or 1.25GB of RAM (1 Transcend 1GB stick + 1 256MB HP Stick).

All sticks are DDR2 533Mhz. I'm wondering because I've heard that mismatching stick sizes kills memory performance and my WoW performance could stand to be a little bit better.

Note: I am not talking about running the memory in a dual-channel configuration. That'll come later when I get enough money for another 1Gb stick. I'm just wondering if I am better of taking out the HP stick that I got because it might actually be negatively affecting my performance.

 

It should be fine, use the HP stick as well.

 

You can run dual channel with different-sized sticks on Intel's mobile 915PM chipset. You won't feel the effect, though.

 

The only way you will be at a disadvantage using the 256MB stick, is if it has higher latencies. The system will run at the slower specs. Otherwise there should be no difference.

You can just try both configurations and benchmark. (sandrasoft, everest, ...)

 

Will dual-channel increase performance significantly in say a game like WoW?

 

dual channel performance gain is minimal when compared to upping the total amount of RAM. If you ran 2 512MB sticks of RAM in dual-channel, you would be much better off running 1.5GB of RAM instead. RAM helps to a certain point in gaming, but 2GB of RAM is pointless when you have a integrated video card and want to game. 1GB of RAM should be just fine for running WOW, I wouldn't bother with a 1.25GB upgrade, I'd go straight to 2GB if I upgraded at all.

Matt

 

I bought a 1GB stick knowing that I would upgrade to 2GB sooner or later. But I don't want to sink all my money into one thing right now.

Though, I am planning on giving one of the 2 256MB sticks to my brother so he can sell it on eBay. I was going to sell it sooner or later, so I'm wondering if I should just take out the 2nd stick now than keep it in and have to deal with selling it later.

 

Dual channel will not increase performance significantly in anything.

RAM will increase performance up to a point, depending on the application. For some, you will have the biggest boost going from 256MB to 512MB. For some, the biggest boost might be going from 1GB to 1.25GB or 1.5GB. On average, there will not be noticeable differences between 1GB and 1.25GB. Sell now or sell later? You never know. I say - don't sell at all. Keep them. Who knows when they might come handy? And if you keep them for several years, you may sell 'em for a lot more when this particular type of RAM becomes scarce. Kinda like regular SDRAM now sells for much higher price than DDR or DDR2.

 

if u have to send your laptop to hp dont they want original ram?

 

Why would they care?

 

No, the reason being that most people upgrade the RAM themselves. Most people when upgrading say the graphics card (if they can) will put the original back in the lappy so that they don't know it was changed. They also take out the hard drive because most companys have hard drives that have the diagnostics on them already.

That is why it won't matter.