Is DDR4 good enough to run a 14700/13900K/14900k?

[KazerLight3]

Hey folks!

 

I'm considering getting a 14700k (or a 13900K or 14900K, depending on whether I find them at a good price).

Having already 2 sticks of 16GB each, DDR4-3600 CL16, I'd like to keep them and use them for my new CPU.

I could buy 2 sticks of 16GB each, DDR5-6000 CL30, but the first-word latency of those new sticks would be higher than my DDR4 sticks, and according to Linus, that's not a smart move.

 

So my question is: for content creation tasks (essentially video editing), will my DDR4 sticks be enough to run those CPUs? Will I be leaving out a lot of performance??

 

Thanks for your answers!

 

 

[Shimejii]

Just gonna be honest, If you are buying a 14700k/14900k, you should just buy the DDR5. DDR4 is for budget systems. 14900k Is FAR from that and you should be using the D5 for the performance gain.  Yes using the proper dimms, speed, and timings will net you a good chunk of performance.

 

Base on the Latency wordplay it seems this may be a troll.

[RONOTHAN##]

10 minutes ago, KazerLight3 said:

DDR5-6000 CL30, but the first-word latency of those new sticks would be higher than my DDR4 sticks, and according to Linus, that's not a smart move.

I know that video you're referencing, and it has a lot of issues regarding how they did the testing. The "first word latency" is not actually all that important to memory performance, and it's not something you can reasonably compare between DDR4 and DDR5. 

 

13 minutes ago, KazerLight3 said:

So my question is: for content creation tasks (essentially video editing), will my DDR4 sticks be enough to run those CPUs? Will I be leaving out a lot of performance??

Video editing is more memory bandwidth heavy than it is latency dependent, and that's where DDR5 really shines. That isn't to say DDR4 would perform badly, but DDR5 would perform a good bit faster. If you have the option to upgrade, I would. 

[SpookyCitrus]

If you're doing a new build or full rebuild where you need to buy a new CPU and Motherboard already. I'd go for a DDR5 build personally.

I only use DDR4 now because, back when Z690 came out and I bought my board, DDR5 was astronomical in price compared to DDR4 so I went the DDR4 route, it's not really that much cheaper to go for DDR4 over DDR5 in a new build or rebuild where you're buying a new CPU and Motherboard already. 

 

I have a 14900k, I run it with 64GB of 3600mhz DDR4 and have zero problems. Prior to that I had 32GB and it was more than fine as well. If you have a solid 3200mhz or higher kit, I don't think you'll have any problems.

 

For video rendering and editing, depending on the program I would recommend upgrading from 16GB to at least 32GB. Ram especially DDR4 is so inexpensive these days it's a no brainer to do at least 32GB.

[Alex Atkin UK]

Just now, RONOTHAN## said:

I know that video you're referencing, and it has a lot of issues regarding how they did the testing. The "first word latency" is not actually all that important to memory performance, and it's not something you can reasonably compare between DDR4 and DDR5. 

 

Video editing is more memory bandwidth heavy than it is latency dependent, and that's where DDR5 really shines. That isn't to say DDR4 would perform badly, but DDR5 would perform a good bit faster. If you have the option to upgrade, I would. 

It certainly didn't seem to make much difference on the 12900k.

 

[Gat Pelsinger]

@KazerLight3

 

DDR4 always wins the first word latency against DDR5, but first word latency isn't all the thing. DDR5 comes with way more bandwidth, which can give a decent boost in creative workloads like video editing.

 

This means that in games like CSGO (idk about CS2), DDR4 takes a small win because it has less latency, but in many other games which can use more bandwidth, DDR5 will win.

 

If you are a person to buy a 14900K, then you might as well buy DDR5, but, if you do value money, then you will not be sent to jail for buying DDR4. Most of the time when you are GPU bound, or running applications which are purely CPU heavy, DDR4 or DDR5 doesn't really make that much of a difference to justify DDR5's price.

[RONOTHAN##]

Just now, Alex Atkin UK said:

It certainly didn't seem to make much difference on the 12900k.

 

The 13th gen memory system is pretty different compared to the 12th gen memory system. In Puget's testing, Premier scaled pretty heavily with memory frequency, which would mean that it's a pretty bandwidth heavy workload.

https://www.pugetsystems.com/labs/articles/impact-of-ddr5-speed-on-content-creation-performance-2023-update/

 

Besides, GN's testing is manually tuned DDR4 while XMP DDR5. Not exactly a like for like comparison. 

[Alex Atkin UK]

16 minutes ago, RONOTHAN## said:

The 13th gen memory system is pretty different compared to the 12th gen memory system. In Puget's testing, Premier scaled pretty heavily with memory frequency, which would mean that it's a pretty bandwidth heavy workload.

https://www.pugetsystems.com/labs/articles/impact-of-ddr5-speed-on-content-creation-performance-2023-update/

 

Besides, GN's testing is manually tuned DDR4 while XMP DDR5. Not exactly a like for like comparison. 

Its actually nice to see Intel weren't just re-releasing the same thing on 13th/14th.

 

Its a lot harder to find people comparing DDR4 to DDR5, annoying Pudget didn't re-test DDR4 at the same time.

 

Certainly if you are buying all new parts, it makes little sense to go DDR4, but its probably not worth replacing the motherboard when upgrading an older rig.

[cmndr]

Paid for memory is a good thing. In general I'm all for reuse of parts. 

 

Quote

Having already 2 sticks of 16GB each, DDR4-3600 CL16, I'd like to keep them and use them for my new CPU.

I could buy 2 sticks of 16GB each, DDR5-6000 CL30, but the first-word latency of those new sticks would be higher than my DDR4 sticks, and according to Linus, that's not a smart move.

Remember that CL is measured in cycles. DDR4-3600 has (3600/6000) only 60% of the cycles of the DDR5 6000 kit. Latency between the two kits will be very similar overall since 16 isn't too far from 60% of 30. 
 

Also keep in mind that most memory accesses are buffered by cache.
Cache sizes are bigger than ever so cache misses are rarer than ever.

This means that more and more cases when there's data NOT in cache it's likely to be A LOT of stuff that needs to be read sequentially and in those cases ~2x bandwidth dominates a small latency hit. 

In the past memory access looked a lot more like "tons of small random hits and occasional long reads" and in that environment latency mattered more. 

[KazerLight3]

Thank you all for your feedback! I guess I'll go for the DDR5 route

I heard that 6000 Mhz is the sweet spot for the CPUs I'm interested in; is that correct?

 

EDIT: I think I'll go with those sticks https://www.amazon.fr/CORSAIR-Vengeance-6000MHz-Informatique-Compatible/dp/B0CD7WZRHF?source=ps-sl-shoppingads-lpcontext&ref_=fplfs&psc=1&smid=A1X6FK5RDHNB96

[RONOTHAN##]

12 minutes ago, KazerLight3 said:

Thank you all for your feedback! I guess I'll go for the DDR5 route

I heard that 6000 Mhz is the sweet spot for the CPUs I'm interested in; is that correct?

I'd argue it's more along the lines of 6400MT/s CL32, since the pricing is basically identical and there is still some scaling to that point (beyond there the scaling does get rather slow, rather fast). If you find a good deal on a 6000 CL30 kit though, that's still fine. 

[KazerLight3]

4 minutes ago, RONOTHAN## said:

I'd argue it's more along the lines of 6400MT/s CL32, since the pricing is basically identical and there is still some scaling to that point (beyond there the scaling does get rather slow, rather fast). If you find a good deal on a 6000 CL30 kit though, that's still fine. 

Alright, I'm gonna go with these then:https://www.amazon.fr/CORSAIR-Vengeance-6400MHz-Dordinateur-Compatible/dp/B0CBRK1HQG/ref=sr_1_11?__mk_fr_FR=ÅMÅŽÕÑ&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.ZTdXgiP5aQrAs1t2c6XCJLRHU5MkklTF1yWSNJfRkfi3ZAPPG4lgskRf23OqhIoeMol1RsRG-tBFCceYKs0d-sRoyOnj_KO_SEj5qsPdDNPJoLkbAvzDIBnYayWhdNn1qliH9VvaAqaoPJ2NXRyqwYdfgLdOwD0kOX3HIXW3X90yV0Psb2LkwoWsOlQ9vgv7wfn1m9aPSQa-eaF5wbr0aNQroh8TMa-uCEfvdFHrVpuiR9C4e8IebvqS2Jcd-G3e2TWpT8LXHYHG5iFxPywJpx7YfeVnCqZeWBxj8rahdn4.mXTKIaoHhafncVnXxkpDAvhcKFU9O4MPFOH4COUG_ic&dib_tag=se&keywords=6400+ra&s=computers&sr=1-11

 

[RONOTHAN##]

8 minutes ago, KazerLight3 said:

Alright, I'm gonna go with these then:https://www.amazon.fr/CORSAIR-Vengeance-6400MHz-Dordinateur-Compatible/dp/B0CBRK1HQG/ref=sr_1_11?__mk_fr_FR=ÅMÅŽÕÑ&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.ZTdXgiP5aQrAs1t2c6XCJLRHU5MkklTF1yWSNJfRkfi3ZAPPG4lgskRf23OqhIoeMol1RsRG-tBFCceYKs0d-sRoyOnj_KO_SEj5qsPdDNPJoLkbAvzDIBnYayWhdNn1qliH9VvaAqaoPJ2NXRyqwYdfgLdOwD0kOX3HIXW3X90yV0Psb2LkwoWsOlQ9vgv7wfn1m9aPSQa-eaF5wbr0aNQroh8TMa-uCEfvdFHrVpuiR9C4e8IebvqS2Jcd-G3e2TWpT8LXHYHG5iFxPywJpx7YfeVnCqZeWBxj8rahdn4.mXTKIaoHhafncVnXxkpDAvhcKFU9O4MPFOH4COUG_ic&dib_tag=se&keywords=6400+ra&s=computers&sr=1-11

 

I would try to get something cheaper, since 170 euros for a kit of that rating is very high. 

https://www.amazon.fr/dp/B0CHY63TJ4?tag=pcp09-21&linkCode=ogi&th=1

Something like this should be the same performance for 30 euros less. 

[Tetras]

1 hour ago, KazerLight3 said:

So my question is: for content creation tasks (essentially video editing), will my DDR4 sticks be enough to run those CPUs? Will I be leaving out a lot of performance??

How intensive is your usage? 32GB is not worth keeping if your usage is anything serious and going DDR5 will give you a max capacity of 256GB, as opposed to 128GB.

 

41 minutes ago, KazerLight3 said:

Alright, I'm gonna go with these then

If you already have 32GB, it seems a bit silly to buy the same capacity and they seem rather pricey too. I'd switch to 48GB or 64GB, so that at  least you get an upgrade on what you have.

 

If your usage is really light, I guess it doesn't matter, but if that was the case, I doubt you'd be buying an i7/i9.

 

You can get an idea which workloads care about RAM speed/bandwidth here:

https://www.pugetsystems.com/labs/articles/impact-of-ddr5-speed-on-content-creation-performance-2023-update/