Ddr4 headache

[Sparky01]

HI,

I Was looking for some help guidance and advice. I got a gigabyte z170 and was looking at buying ram for it in the next month or two later than expected thanks to getting laid off suddenly.

Anyways someone gave me 16gb of corsair vengeance cmu32gx4m2c3000c15r... It was part of a set but they accidently damaged the other stick. They have said I should try and get another stick to 'pair it' to ensure it runs well on the board. I don't think I'll need any more Ram however as I don't do anything over the top. But could I buy any let's say 4 or 8gb stick and pop it in also so long as it's 3000mhz or would I be better off looking for another corsair stick in the same league as this one?

I Looked around but it seems to be a bit of debate whether you should or should match non original paired sets of ddr4. Can anyone recommend something cheap and cheerful if needs be?

 

Any help with this headache would be appreciated

 

[porina]

Just run the single stick and see how you get on. The quantity is plenty enough for most things. You will lose out on some bandwidth, but unless you know you have a performance deficit or too much money, don't worry about adding a 2nd stick. If you were to add a 2nd stick, ideally it would be the same part, so same size, speed, internal configuration, timings... to make matters more complicated, they may sell variations under the same name.

[Sparky01]

Hey thanks a bunch for the speedy reply.

If I wanted to improve the bandwidth would I buy a 32gb set that this ram originally came from to give me 3 sticks of ram or would I look at a single 16gb stick to give me 2 total sticks? Does it have to be 2 or 4 sticks or will 3 give me the better bandwidth? As I said don't think I'll ever need more ram but might as well find out now if it's not too much hassle

Sorry for the headache

[porina]

Z170 supports dual channel, so optimal is 2 or 4 identical sticks. If you wanted to go 2 sticks, it would be better to get a new kit and use that, and sell on this single stick. I'd really not worry about it and just run the single for now.

[paddy-stone]

Just now, porina said:

Z170 supports dual channel, so optimal is 2 or 4 identical sticks. If you wanted to go 2 sticks, it would be better to get a new kit and use that, and sell on this single stick. I'd really not worry about it and just run the single for now.

Agree with this, the difference between running single channel and dual channel is debateable anyway. I don't think you'll have any negative effects of running a single DIMM at all, and 16GB is plenty for most people, so see how you get on, and if you have any problems come back for help as the problems may not be due to this ram stick anyway, so better to ask than to assume fault. Hope it all goes wel for you