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Lets talk about RAM

Hello all,

 

In my journey to build my first PC, I've found the subject or RAM to be trickier than I had anticipated. Initially I thought RAM was a simpler, less expensive component of building a PC...oh how wrong I was. So now I'm forced to yet again ask the good people of this forum for a bit of guidance so that I can hopefully get my questions answered. I plan to use a Ryzen 2700X CPU, ASUS ROG X470 motherboard, and G.Skill Trident Z RGB RAM (because, you know, pretty lights and all that). 

 

So here are my questions.

 

What is more important, speed or CAS latency? i.e. Which would be better, 3200MHz CL16, or 2800MHz CL14?

 

There seem to be some memory cards pre-configured or optimized for AMD CPU's, is this some specialized intrinsic feature within the memory, or merely just preset optimized timings that I could set within my BIOS once I set up my PC?

 

Is there anything else I should keep in mind while RAM shopping? 

 

Thanks in advance.

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14 minutes ago, SteveKaboom said:

What is more important, speed or CAS latency? i.e. Which would be better, 3200MHz CL16, or 2800MHz CL14?

Lower latency is always preferred, but speed may be more preferable depending on the platform you're using. For example, Intel platforms have largely been unaffected by RAM speeds faster than the default ones. But Ryzen systems, faster speeds over DDR4-2166 do have a noticeable impact in a lot of applications.

 

However note that the latency number is clock cycles. To get the actual time, you have to take the latency times the frequency period. In this case, both settings have the same latency (5 nanoseconds), so the 3200MHz RAM would be better if only given the parameters above. There's a lot more latency figures than CAS latency.

 

Quote

There seem to be some memory cards pre-configured or optimized for AMD CPU's, is this some specialized intrinsic feature within the memory, or merely just preset optimized timings that I could set within my BIOS once I set up my PC?

If it's like XMP, it's probably baked into the RAM to tell the motherboard what to use.

 

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So I probably should get the "AMD" RAM.

 

What do you recommend for good speed and latency. Im looking at 3000+ MHz and CL14-16, but maybe that's too high end, a lot of it is pretty expensive.

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6 minutes ago, SteveKaboom said:

So I probably should get the "AMD" RAM.

 

What do you recommend for good speed and latency. Im looking at 3000+ MHz and CL14-16, but maybe that's too high end, a lot of it is pretty expensive.

get the one with higher MHZ. Theoretically, 2400 cas 12 and 4000 cas 20 should yield the same speed but empirically, the higher MHZ yields better results. Especially with AMDs infinity fabric, MHZ is very important. Usually the point of diminishing return is somewhere between 3200 and 3600. After that point, the price is no longer justifiable.

CPU: 8600k @4.9  (1.39v) |  Cooler: NH-U14s | Mobo: Asus Strix z390i | Ram: Gskill DDR4 Trident Z 3600 8GB x 2 16-16-16-36

GPU: Gigabyte G1 1080 GTX | Case: Prodigy ITX | Fans: NH-A14, (exhaust) NH-A12, (intake) NH-A20 (intake)

Samsung EVO 1tb | Samsung EVO 512gb x2 | Intel ssd 128gb

PSU: Powerstation 500W

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get 16gb min. but with an AMD system, I think 32 is better since most AMD users are content creators.

CPU: 8600k @4.9  (1.39v) |  Cooler: NH-U14s | Mobo: Asus Strix z390i | Ram: Gskill DDR4 Trident Z 3600 8GB x 2 16-16-16-36

GPU: Gigabyte G1 1080 GTX | Case: Prodigy ITX | Fans: NH-A14, (exhaust) NH-A12, (intake) NH-A20 (intake)

Samsung EVO 1tb | Samsung EVO 512gb x2 | Intel ssd 128gb

PSU: Powerstation 500W

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