Ivy Bridge RAM Speed and Base Clock Info

[eXa]

Still there are some gains even with 2133 ram. Ofc not everywhere, but not everything benefits from a 4.7ghz SB either.
Im not really arguing if its worth it or not, just that there is actually some "ok" gains in certain situations when going for higher speed ram. (yes even in several games)

[Manicdan]

1066 x 4 = 4264
3000 x 2 = 6000
2133 x 2 = 4264

Effectively Dual Channel 2133 = 1066 Quad Channel

but thats comparing the same timings right? id imaging 3000 sure wont have CL6 like 1066 can do

[eXa]

True, i wont be suprised if 1333 quad is enough to beat/equal dual 3000 (assuming non slack cas 9 or something 1333mhz.)

[Mungri]

With the price of of the 2x2 Gb 2133 sticks being so low, I agree that it is definitely worth buying these for a sandy bridge system.

But 4 Gb ram is already beginning to reach its limits now, and increasingly more people want to use 2x4 gb sets instead.

but thats comparing the same timings right? id imaging 3000 sure wont have CL6 like 1066 can do

I have some 2 Gb sticks of Geil Elipda ram sat in my mobo box that could do 1700 Mhz Cas 6, and are rated for 9-9-9-24 2133 Mhz. No one wanted to buy them second hand, and I dont blame them with how cheap the G Skill sets currently are. Though my 4 Gb sticks at the same frequency and Cas 9 actually made my PC faster in everyday use somehow. Gaming differences between cas 6 and cas 9 1600 Mhz are completely minimal on both X58 and SB.

[BeepBeep2]

but thats comparing the same timings right? id imaging 3000 sure wont have CL6 like 1066 can do

Sorry, 2133 CL7 vs 1066 CL7, sure 1066 CL6 even. Then again, everyone uses 8GB kits that probably couldn't hit 3000 with current IC's unless at CAS 11

[eXa]

I dont think they will come close to 3000 stable, not even with cas 11, but im just guessing....

[Manicdan]

Sorry, 2133 CL7 vs 1066 CL7, sure 1066 CL6 even. Then again, everyone uses 8GB kits that probably couldn't hit 3000 with current IC's unless at CAS 11

the point was you cant simply compare slow to fast, when one can have much tighter timings than the other. double the speed is not going to be 2x faster due to the massive difference in latency. as ram gets better and can reach 3000mhz, timings will get better for the lower speeds aswell.

[Manabu]

Faster memory will matter if the IGP get's faster. Llano IGP benefits a great deal from DDR3 1883Mhz, for example.

[Hornet331]

Intels igp is less bandwidth depanded because of the connection to the L3, sure you will see gains (espcial for higher res), but I am sure they are lower then wat you see on llano. Of course that also has to do with the fact that the gpu it self isn't that powerfull and therefore needs a lot less bandwidth to achive its performance.

The redwood core on llano is so bandwidth starved it isn't funny.

[saaya]

SandyBridge could not even utilize more than DDR3-1333, I doubt how Intel will utilize DDR3-2133 in IvyBridge...

true... ivybridges gpu is only supposed to be 30% faster, so its weird...

[saaya]

The redwood core on llano is so bandwidth starved it isn't funny.

really?
i thought i saw a review where discrete vs apu was very close?

[eXa]

really?
i thought i saw a review where discrete vs apu was very close?

Look at the gains you get with higher speed ram instead.

[BeepBeep2]

Look at the gains you get with higher speed ram instead.

Above 1600/1866, gains are minimal.

[Mungri]

Look at the gains you get with higher speed ram instead.

We have looked at them, even the ones you posted concluded that the gains are minimal over 1866 Mhz on SB.

Also current sandy bridge results =/= how ram clocks will affect Ivy Bridge. I'm pretty sure that any gains with faster ram will be even smaller in quad channel than it currently is on triple channel boards.

Higher ram clocks only affect dual channel so much because the bandwidth is lower at equal clocks compared to triple channel, and quad channel will have even higher bandwidth possible without needing 2000+ Mhz modules.

[kl0012]

I miss the point of the whole debate. Why not to support faster memory if they can. There is no damage from supporting faster RAM. Indeed SB is less sensitive to a RAM speed (actually all Intel CPUs since C2D are less sensitive to RAM speeds because of the advanced prefetchers and memory disambiguation system) but there are cases where even SB may get serious gain from faster RAM (such as heavy multitasking and/or heavy multithreading with intensive mem access).

Intels igp is less bandwidth depanded because of the connection to the L3, sure you will see gains (espcial for higher res), but I am sure they are lower then wat you see on llano. Of course that also has to do with the fact that the gpu it self isn't that powerfull and therefore needs a lot less bandwidth to achive its performance.

The redwood core on llano is so bandwidth starved it isn't funny.

It depends on the game I guess. As far as I know SB IGP bypasses the L3 for texture reads to avoid cache trashing. Faster RAM my benefit some games even on SB. Here is an example:
http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1599/9/
Not that it's too much important for integrated graphics but Intel lately decided to evaluate OpenCL, so faster RAM might be good for some GPU computing.

[Mungri]

Does running 3 modules for 6 Gb on SB remove the benefit of dual channel ram or not?

Or is it a 4 Gb + 2 Gb module? I just realized its a laptop review, thats probably going to be a different case to a gaming desktop setup.

Reading through the setups on the laptop reviewed, I also noticed that the ram is running at 2T. Surely 1333 Mhz ram @ 9-9-9-28 and 2T is NEVER going to be used in a gaming desktop PC.

The tests are also using Intel HD Graphics 3000, doesnt that use shared memory?

[eXa]

We have looked at them, even the ones you posted concluded that the gains are minimal over 1866 Mhz on SB.

Also current sandy bridge results =/= how ram clocks will affect Ivy Bridge. I'm pretty sure that any gains with faster ram will be even smaller in quad channel than it currently is on triple channel boards.

Higher ram clocks only affect dual channel so much because the bandwidth is lower at equal clocks compared to triple channel, and quad channel will have even higher bandwidth possible without needing 2000+ Mhz modules.

What you quoted there was a reply to Saaya regarding Llano...

Does running 3 modules for 6 Gb on SB remove the benefit of dual channel ram or not?

Or is it a 4 Gb + 2 Gb module? I just realized its a laptop review, thats probably going to be a different case to a gaming desktop setup.

Reading through the setups on the laptop reviewed, I also noticed that the ram is running at 2T. Surely 1333 Mhz ram @ 9-9-9-28 and 2T is NEVER going to be used in a gaming desktop PC.

The tests are also using Intel HD Graphics 3000, doesnt that use shared memory?

4+2gb yes, i red somewhere that it runs as dual channel up to 4gb but singelchannel from 4gb to 6gb (usage that is) but i thought it sounded weird, and i dont have a clue really

[zanzabar]

4+2gb yes, i red somewhere that it runs as dual channel up to 4gb but singelchannel from 4gb to 6gb (usage that is) but i thought it sounded weird, and i dont have a clue really

u still need matching channels to run in dual channe (so if u had 4 slots u could run (2x 2+1) to stay in dual channel but laptops have 2 slots so u could not, the newer SB parts can run in ganged mode like amd can to make a it a 128bit buss instead of 2x64bot and thats better than single channel, runnign it like that is fine for access times and cashing but its not as good for raw bandwidth.

on topic, i think that the latency in time will matter for IB and not the clock speed as it will have a crapload of bandwidth but only 6 cores at launch.

[Aerwidh]

Thanks for the info

[Olivon]

Exclusive: Intel's future base clock options unveiled - VRZone

We were disappointed to learn that Intel will only offer a single base clock option for Ivy Bridge beyond the 100MHz of Sandy Bridge, name 133MHz. For those of you that hoped to be able to overclock Ivy Bridge to your heart's content, well, it ain't gonna happen. Apparently Intel is worried that Ivy Bridge will compete with its LGA-2011 platform if it was to add more base clock options and as such things aren't set to improve much over Sandy Bridge.

Unlike Ivy Bridge, Intel has enabled several options for Sandy Bridge-E and we're hearing that we can expect base clock frequencies of 100, 125, 166, 200 and 250MHz if memory serves. This might still change before the launch of the Waimea Bay platform as Intel tweak things to work as well as possible for overclockers.