Rethinking optimal RAM Speed for Skylake builds...
Posted: Sun May 29, 2016 9:43 am
When Skylake first came out, it appeared Intel had another generation that gained very little benefit in real world uses from DDR4 RAM speed increase of 2400 over 2133 except for some fringe cases (extreme overclocking, etc).
Larry compared 2133 vs 3000 on a stock i7-6700K, ADATA XPG SX910 128GB, GT 640 and found the performance difference to be minimal (except for iGP use).
Legit Reviews used an i7-6700K OC'ed to 4.6GHz, Corsair Neutron GTX 240GB SSD, GTX 980 Ti and found a tiny bump in Handbrake performance going up to 2400 or 2666 and then flat. Gaming with a 980 Ti was also flat (for the few games tested).
[H]ardocp used an i7-6700K at 4.5MHZ, Samsung 840 Pro 128GB, GTX Titan and found media apps like Handbrake to be flat across the RAM speed range. Video games run at low resolution with the Titan (so the gfx card didn't impact fps results) showed some scaling...
...and then Techspot used an i7-6700K at 4.5GHz, Samsung 950 Pro 512GB, and SLI GTX 980 Ti's and got completely different results. Handbrake and Adobe Photoshop CC, and games with significant scaling. Ok, it's not apples to apples versus the above due to stock vs OC CPU, low end GPU vs high end vs high end SLI, and also different SSDs. But there is a trend for the higher end systems. Compare the Witcher III SLI vs the single 980 Ti results. Very little benefit of faster RAM for the single card, but significant bump for SLI.
So, what are the differentiators? Is there some mix of overclocked CPU and high end GPU that taxes the memory and storage systems? Will this increase or decrease with the lower overhead and better CPU utilization of DX12 and Vulcan? Will this start to impact the single card gfx systems as Pascal and Polaris hit?
I'm leaning toward these recommendations as RAM prices have dropped:
- General purpose build, media center: DDR4 2133 is fine. Chances are DDR4 2400 cost the same.
- Gaming build 1080p: DDR4 2400-2666
- Gaming build 1440p+: DDR4 3000
- Heavy media creator, video work: home use DDR4 3000, workplace - faster (time is money )
Larry compared 2133 vs 3000 on a stock i7-6700K, ADATA XPG SX910 128GB, GT 640 and found the performance difference to be minimal (except for iGP use).
Legit Reviews used an i7-6700K OC'ed to 4.6GHz, Corsair Neutron GTX 240GB SSD, GTX 980 Ti and found a tiny bump in Handbrake performance going up to 2400 or 2666 and then flat. Gaming with a 980 Ti was also flat (for the few games tested).
[H]ardocp used an i7-6700K at 4.5MHZ, Samsung 840 Pro 128GB, GTX Titan and found media apps like Handbrake to be flat across the RAM speed range. Video games run at low resolution with the Titan (so the gfx card didn't impact fps results) showed some scaling...
...and then Techspot used an i7-6700K at 4.5GHz, Samsung 950 Pro 512GB, and SLI GTX 980 Ti's and got completely different results. Handbrake and Adobe Photoshop CC, and games with significant scaling. Ok, it's not apples to apples versus the above due to stock vs OC CPU, low end GPU vs high end vs high end SLI, and also different SSDs. But there is a trend for the higher end systems. Compare the Witcher III SLI vs the single 980 Ti results. Very little benefit of faster RAM for the single card, but significant bump for SLI.
So, what are the differentiators? Is there some mix of overclocked CPU and high end GPU that taxes the memory and storage systems? Will this increase or decrease with the lower overhead and better CPU utilization of DX12 and Vulcan? Will this start to impact the single card gfx systems as Pascal and Polaris hit?
I'm leaning toward these recommendations as RAM prices have dropped:
- General purpose build, media center: DDR4 2133 is fine. Chances are DDR4 2400 cost the same.
- Gaming build 1080p: DDR4 2400-2666
- Gaming build 1440p+: DDR4 3000
- Heavy media creator, video work: home use DDR4 3000, workplace - faster (time is money )