PCFormat Forum Archive

Hiya,

Can someone please confirm this? Wanna get 4GB ram for my new pc setup, and asked a guy at a pc store about ram and motherboards. He said that if a mobo has 4 ram slots and can run dual channel ram (2 slots are green, 2 slots are black for this example), I HAVE TO get 4 sets of ram (4 x 1GB), otherwise dual channel wont work. So he is saying both colour slots must have same ram in it to use the dual channel? (I know it must be same make of ram...but thats not to do with this)

So that means, according to him, that I must get 4 x 1GB sticks of ram to make use of a dual channel mob??

But I thought you only need to use either both the green slots, or both the black slots, and you dont have to use all 4? You could stick in 2 x 2GB ram instead. So if you have 2 x 2GB ram and slot 1 into each of the green slots for example, it will run dual channel. If you put 1 ram in green, and 1 ram in black...it runs single channel?

Am I right, or is he right? Get the feeling they were trying to take me for a ride?

Cheers
SB

SilverBack, go back to the store and bitchslap that guy, for dual channel to work you only need 2 of the same stick ie: 2x 2Gb in the matching slots. obviously 1 stick in diff slots wont work

You can run dual channel with two sticks of ram, they just must be in the correct color slots (ie: both must be in yellow or both in black)

go tell the guy to go jump in the sea, not only is he talking crap but he is also preventing you from future upgrading of ram by adding more ram sticks.

BS - LOL!

Bloody b@stard, I thought so!! Grrr....thanks for clearing that up, I thought I was right!

take a ban stick with to the shop

No need for violence

depending on the motherboard, you can still run dual channel using 4x1GB sticks or RAM as well as 2X1/2GB Sticks of RAM
most Boards that support Dual Channel are indicated with color coded Slots ie- Blue ,black

stick in 2 sticks of Identical ram into the blue(corresponding slots) to run dual channel
or 4 sticks , 2xblue & 2xblack( which ever color ) to run dual channel using all the slots on the board,


hope this helps

Go back to the shop.
Walk up to the counter.
Get his attention and call him over.
With him standing right in front of you, FACEPALM.
Walk out the shop.

junjun wrote:No need for violence

depending on the motherboard, you can still run dual channel using 4x1GB sticks or RAM as well as 2X1/2GB Sticks of RAM
most Boards that support Dual Channel are indicated with color coded Slots ie- Blue ,black

stick in 2 sticks of Identical ram into the blue(corresponding slots) to run dual channel
or 4 sticks , 2xblue & 2xblack( which ever color ) to run dual channel using all the slots on the board,


hope this helps

the question was, MUST you get 4 sticks of ram to use dual channel, the answer is no, you can run it with 2 sticks.

having 4x1gb sticks wouldnt be as smart as using 2x2gb sticks, as it prevents future upgrading and isnt necessary, seeing that 2 sticks works fine.

Facepalm

junjun wrote:depending on the motherboard, you can still run dual channel using 4x1GB sticks or RAM as well as 2X1/2GB Sticks of RAM
most Boards that support Dual Channel are indicated with color coded Slots ie- Blue ,black

stick in 2 sticks of Identical ram into the blue(corresponding slots) to run dual channel
or 4 sticks , 2xblue & 2xblack( which ever color ) to run dual channel using all the slots on the board,

He was saying that you have to have 4 sticks of ram to run dual channel, it wont work with only 2 sticks of both in green slots / both in black slots. He basically said if I do the latter, its single channel, but he was wrong.

Firestrm wrote:SilverBack, go back to the store and bitchslap that guy, for dual channel to work you only need 2 of the same stick ie: 2x 2Gb in the matching slots. obviously 1 stick in diff slots wont work