2GB = slower than 512MB?

This really puzzles me. I got a Sony FE (nVidea 7400 Go) with 512MB 533 CL4 RAM (Sony's RAM prices are unbeievable!!!). I thought I'd speed up my system with some extra juice and bought Corsair Value Select RAM. 2x1GB 667 CL5 RAM.

Super Pi didn't change (and I didn't expect it to change as it is just pure calculation) with 1m13s.

3D Mark 05 dropped 11 points from 1714 to 1703 and PC Mark 05 increased a massive amount of 12 points from 3814 to 3826.

Anyone have any idea what's going on? I thought I'd see at least some increase considering that I quadroupled my RAM and its also 667MHz instead of 533...

 

The 3DMark 05 score is largely due to random variation; you'll get a slightly different score every time you run it, so your score didn't really decline. Super Pi is largely processor-based, and doesn't require a lot of RAM to run.

The other thing to consider is that these are individual applications, none of which really require more than 512MB of RAM to run.

What you'll see an improvement on is multitasking. When you're running more than one application at once, at some point you'll use up the 512MB, and your system will slow down when Windows starts using your hard disk as a swap file. Having 2GB reduces this slowdown with multiple applications significantly.

Even the new Core Duos have most of their memory bandwidth needs satisfied by 533MHz RAM, especially in dual channel mode like you have it running. Thus, you won't really see a big difference in performance switching from 533 to 667 RAM.

In summary, don't worry. Your computer will run better, but not in immediately noticeable ways. Having too little RAM usually makes itself quite apparent very quickly.

 

Run multiple applications especially those that requires a lot of ram and you'll see the difference.

 

Start Far Cry, FEAR, Quake 4. You will see the difference very quickly.

Cheers,

 

Yeah, the most nocticeable difference will be the responsivness of the system. There should be next to no lag with 2GB of RAM. Also like ikovac said, just start up a demanding game and you'll notice the difference.

Matt

 

11 points and 12 points is within the margain of error, so don't worry.

You'll notice a difference when you open large files or start multitasking.

 

Thanks for all the replies!! You are probably all right. I just thought since the nVidea 7400 Go was advertised as sharing some of that system memory, my 3D score would jump up a little. FEAR is running fine and without and lag on medium settings, have yet to try other settings.

 

For the FEAR issue. You need to shut off the lighting and turn off shadows. That helps alot.

For the shadows they have to re-render everytime something moves or there is a new source of light.

 

u may wanto check if that laptop has any ram bugs, for instance the msi 1029, reduces any rams clock speed to 266mhz whenever both slots are full, u may be experiencing a similar issue.

 

Latency, memory timings. those could be your causes.

 

While the nforce 7400 supports 256mb of ram it can only really take advantage of 128, the cards not powerful enough to use more than that. So thats probally why you didnt get a change in the 3d mark, as far as it was concerned it had all the ram it needed with 512.