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Old July 27th 03, 04:47 AM
William
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"John" wrote in message
...
I used 2 sticks of Kingston 2700 in my board 256 meg each works fine
"Devast8or" wrote in message
k...
Paul wrote:
In article ,
"Devast8or" wrote:

Hi all,

I wanna buy this board
http://www.asus.com/prog/spec.asp?m=A7V8X-X&langs=01 (an A7V8X-X),
but RAM should I get for it?

As far as I can see PC1600 and PC2100 should be any problem, no
matter how I do it. PC3200 would work if I only use two banks (Do I
_have_ to use two banks, or is one fine?). But what about PC2700? It
says "PC2700 Max to 4 banks only", but the board only has three mem
banks.

I'm confuzzled. What RAM should I buy for this board?

TIA

Devast8or

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When buying a -X board, download the original board manual, and the
-X board manual and compare them carefully, to see what functionality
they are missing. For example, the A7V8X has adjustable AGP voltage
and
the A7V8X-X does not. There was a guy yesterday who was having what I
thought were AGP problems, but I couldn't reply to him "Adjust the AGP
voltage", because it is missing on that board. So, be careful when
buying the -X boards, because some have too much functionality
removed.
This advice also applies if you plan on overclocking, as some of the
-X boards don't have the same clock adjustments.


Thanks for the tip. I took a look on Asus.com and saw a number of
differences, but nothing I can't live with. I'll take a look at the

manuals
some day soon.

To answer your question, a double sided DIMM is two banks. A single
sided DIMM is one bank. So, the PC3200 limit is one double sided DIMM
or two single sided DIMMs. The PC2700 limit is two double sided DIMMs
or a double sided plus two single sided DIMMs. The stated limits in
the manual have to do with signal reflections, and they get worse with
clock rate - that is why Asus recommends fewer "loads" on the memory
bus at higher memory clock speeds. Some memories are slightly better
than others in this respect, but there is no way of predicting which
brands are good (designs change too much to make this something you
can depend on year after year).


Ah, I see. That makes a lot more sense that what I quoted from Asus.com



So if I buy one 512MB PC2700 block, I should be home free, right?

To figure out what brand of ram to buy, search in groups.google.com
and see whether people report the board as being "finicky" or
"sensitive" to the ram being used. If there are a lot of reports like
that, then buy branded RAM. If any ram seems to work, in the posts you
read, then try a generic RAM. If you are trying to max out the memory
on the board, expect to pay more for RAM to get it to work reliably.
In other words, placing a single 512MB stick in there (double sided),
probably any brand will work. Use the slot furthest from the
processor,
when using a single stick. Use slots 1 and 3 for two sticks.

Also, search the forums of abxzone.com for your board model, as there
may be more comments over there.

HTH,
Paul


I'll probably buy Kingston. It's a good price and it's mentioned as one

of
the brands working with the A7V8X (non -X) at PC3200. I expect that to

work
with this board too.

Thanks for the answers everyone.

Devast8or

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you can (3) pc 2100 ,(2) pc2700,(1) pc 3200 on the asus A7V8X mother and

the a7v8x-x is run off the of the a7v8x with out some of the features like
sara and others.