Random Question

[Master Disaster]

This is not a help topic, I'm asking a question in the hope that someone might provide an answer as I've wondered about it for ages.

Its in regard to RAM, I will explain before I ask the question.

OK so I'm old enough to remember EDORAM which AFAIK is unique in that it required parity to function, that is to say it required 2 matching sticks to be inserted into the board for it to work.

Moving on from EDO we hit SDR SDRAM which when it launched was Single channel only (it wasn't even called single channel back then) and everything was great, you could use 1 or more sticks at a time in any order and of any type you liked.

Then SDR moved onto DDR and things began to change, boards now required 2 matched sticks in specific slots to work in dual channel mode despite them working just fine with 1 stick in single channel mode.

Intel changed things again with the Core I CPUs, the first revision supported tri channel while subsequent variations reverted back to dual with the E series supporting quad channel.

Now I fully understand what dual, tri and quad channel mode is doing however its been shown time and time again that the difference between 2 identical sticks (or 3 or 4 for tri/quad mode) running in dual mode vs the same 2 sticks running in single mode is so tiny its almost unmeasurable and usually with margin of error anyway which brings me to my question.

What is the point of multi channel memory?

If it makes so little difference to performance why do they insist on sticking with it? Why not just drop it and go with single mode?

If they did drop it it would mean freedom to mix and match any RAM in any slot without worrying about it not working cause its not dual channel.

The only answer I can come up with is marketing, it means they can sell us more RAM as they sell them in multi channel kits but even that falls flat when you consider that Intel don't make RAM so have nothing to gain by selling us more RAM anyway.

Anyone got any insights as to why they keep using this limiting and costly standard?

[Oshino Shinobu]

With DDR3, it admittedly doesn't make much difference in most cases. In synthetic benchmarks, sure, but pretty much everything else, you see no real benefit. However, with DDR4, people have seen a much bigger improvement, so it can actually help with things like rendering and video editing. 

 

Marketing probably plays a big part, because more bandwidth has to be better, right? 

 

The standard isn't stopping people from mixing RAM, but there's not much point in getting rid of it when it can give some performance benefits, while still allowing people to just run in single channel if they want.