Ram buying suggestions?

[felix]

Motherbord: ASUS P7P55D LGA 1156
CURRENT RAM Installed: F3-10666CL8D-4GBHK 4GB (2x2)

CPU: Intel Core i5-750 Lynnfield 2.66GHz LGA 1156 95W QUAD-CORE.

Power supply: Cosair: 400W

OS: Windows 7 64bits Home Premium


What particular model of ram can I buy to increase from currently 4GB to 12GB?
Thank you.

[RamJam]

First things first, do you have the stock P55D or is it one of the varients, i.e. Premium, Pro, EVO, LE, Deluxe, etc?

Next, do you plan to use the 4 you currantly have? or in other words, want to add 8GB (2x4)?

Lastly, is there a particular application you plan to employ the specifically calls for 12GB? I ask, because most users have to work at it to push 8GB unless doing doing heavy video editing, high end graphics work, simulation, etc.

Anyway,

If you have the stock mobo, plaln to use the RAM you have, then you'll want to add 2x4, you could try the

F3-10666CL9D-8GBRL which is a 2x4 set at the same speed of 1333, but will have to play with the timings to get the two sets to work together. A better choice would be to get the

F3-12800CL9D-8GBRL which is rated at 1600 and downclock it to 1333, which might give you the leeway at 1333 to run this set at the same timings of your current set at 8-8-8-21, though you may have to slip a little to 8-8-8-24.

Another option would be to phase out your current RAM and just go straight to a 16 GB set i.e. the 1600 set, F3-12800CL9Q-16GBRL, or the 1333 set, F3-10666CL9Q-16GBRL.

With the other mobos, your options are pretty much the same, but a couple of the other mobos are quite a bit easier to work with w/ RAM combos, i.e. the Premium flavors (-E and plain wrapper) and the Deluxe.....the EVO isn't bad either.

[felix]

[QUOTE=RamJam;11188]First things first, do you have the stock P55D or is it one of the varients, i.e. Premium, Pro, EVO, LE, Deluxe, etc?


Just the plain stock P55D

Next, do you plan to use the 4 you currantly have? or in other words, want to add 8GB (2x4)?

Yes, I would like to use the 4 I currently have if possible,or a better option.

Lastly, is there a particular application you plan to employ the specifically calls for 12GB?[/I]


No particular application,just a heavy multitasking.
[/I]

What do you mean by this following sentence,can you please explain it a little better? [/I]:I ask, because most users have to work at it to push 8GB unless doing doing heavy video editing, high end graphics work, simulation, etc.

Thanks

[G.SKILL]

if you would like to keep the original 4GB, we'd recommend you to choose F3-10666CL9D-8GBR, which is DDR3 1333, 9-9-9-24, 2x4GB kits
if you mix different memory, they would only run at the lower spec, so weonly recommend you to choose DDR3 1333 9-9-9-24 product
thanks


G.S

[felix]

With the above model,would I have to change some setting in bios? Thanks.

[G.SKILL]

no
you could just keep all setting default, then it would run fine at DDR3 1333 9-9-9-24
thanks


G.S

[felix]

Thanks for giving me more than one option to work with.

[RamJam]

I've run into very few users (even heavy multitaskers) that really would need 12GB or more, what you might want to do is open a few apps and go to work with w/ Performance Monitor on and see how much of your RAM you're currently using, see where you stand with what you've got and then envision how much would be needed for what you want to do.

Also, I suggested the 1600, in part because it can take some tweaking to get mixed sets to run together and the 1600, when downclocked would offer more leeway in setting up timings mutally satisfactory (read stability) to each set, further, if you can't get them to work together, you'll still have 8 GB that can run at 1600 with the option open to upgrade to 16GB in the future if you ever find 8 to be insufficient.

[felix]

I'll seriouly consider your suugestions.Thanks.

[Tradesman]

For what it's worth, if your set on upping the RAM to 12GB, I'd lean towards the suggestion by Ramjam with the 1600, mixing sticks of different sizes and base timings can be tricky, and yes, you will more than likely have to get into the Advanced Timings and make adjustments, the BIOS on these boards is based on setups of 1,2,4,8 and 16GB of RAM so 12 will probably raise a few flags with the AUTO settings (found out the hard way).

Another option to consider to speed up your box (in comparison to the $400+ for the 2x4GB sets) would be to get another 4GB set to give you 8GB total $100 at the Egg to match up your current pair) and put the other $300+ into a 128GB or so SSD. You could put your OS and primary apps on the SSD and secondary apps and data on your current HD - this combo will give you a better overall boost than going to 12GB