DDR4 timings matter for Z170?

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zaniix

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Trying to decide between 2 Corsair Vengeance LPX kits, both are 2x8gb

Its PC4-24000 (3000MHz) with 15-17-17-35 vs PC4-25600 (3200MHz) at 16-18-18-36


The PC4-25600 is cheaper I assume due to the looser timings, but should I care about the timings? Does anyone think there will be any real world impact to the performance or ability to overclock on a Z170?
 
Anandtech's testing on DDR3 showed that high MHz high CAS was generally preferable to low MHz low CAS given that both had about the same latency. My guess is that DDR4 will be the same.
 
So pretty much get the fastest clock ram you can afford or is there a sweet spot for skylake?
 
Based on [H]OCP's review, the fastest you can afford, but performance starts to taper off around 3200 MHz.
 
I think 2800/2666 will get you where you need to be if you are gaming.
 
silk186 said:
I don't even think boards officially support over 3200
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Guess it depends what you mean by official, anything over 2133 is officially an overclock... ASUS is touting 3400 OC support all over the place tho (it's like one of the first bullet points on each board's page) and they have some kits that fast (and faster IIRC) on their QVL.

Not that I'm arguing in favor of it, bought 2666 stuff myself and I doubt I'll even push it to 3000, but a lot of the different vendors and brands are getting pretty aggressive in marketing Skylake's high RAM OC potential, FWIW. Prices up thru 2666/2800 are a lot saner tho.
 
I went with a 2666mhz C16 4x8GB LPX kit for $260 partly because they only seem to be making kits with blue spreaders in 4x variants (really wanted blue :p ), and I didn't wanna go 4x4GB and cut off upgrade flexibility down the line.

Was only planning on getting 2x8GB originally, still unsure whether I'll keep or sell two of the four 8GB DIMMs I bought but I figure there's no hurry to decide... Can't even test it until the 6700K pops out it's groundhog hole.

From what I saw G.Skill had kits with slightly better timings and/or speed for the money, but I also wanted to go with LPX if possible for the very low profile sides spreaders. Ripjaws would fit under my cooler but with the fans shifted up slightly.
 
Impulse said:
I went with a 2666mhz C16 4x8GB LPX kit for $260 partly because they only seem to be making kits with blue spreaders in 4x variants (really wanted blue :p ), and I didn't wanna go 4x4GB and cut off upgrade flexibility down the line.

Was only planning on getting 2x8GB originally, still unsure whether I'll keep or sell two of the four 8GB DIMMs I bought but I figure there's no hurry to decide... Can't even test it until the 6700K pops out it's groundhog hole.

From what I saw G.Skill had kits with slightly better timings and/or speed for the money, but I also wanted to go with LPX if possible for the very low profile sides spreaders. Ripjaws would fit under my cooler but with the fans shifted up slightly.
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I am still on the fence about 16gb vs 32gb. I prefer to only run 2 dimms and I think a 2x 16 might be hard to find and more expensive that 4x8. I do have a few programs that might occasionally take advantage of the extra memory, but it isnt that often so the benefit is minimal. Of course it also makes it feel like an bigger upgrade and there is the "because I can" factor as well.

There may be more DDR4 options by the time they finally get some 6700ks in stock. My case arrived yesterday which for some odd reason makes it much harder to wait.
 
I really think the 32gb is overkill for most people. Previously many were jumping up to 16gb before because of the crazy low prices. It was thought by some that 16gb would be of use more after the new console cycle but that doesn't seem to be the case either. I will be moving to 16gb because I always increase my memory when I change memory in an upgrade. I don't even think the list of 64bit games is very long though things may improve most gamers upgrade to windows 10 which I believe is only in 64bit (I could be wrong on this point). I seriously think we will have moved on from DDR4 by the time 32GB is useful for gaming.

Memory needs have increased linearly while memory size has increased exponentially in the case of ram. This is not the case with SSD size and GPU memory.

I will probably order the 16gb 3200 kit from Corsair as it is one of the cheapest 16gb kits in the UK right now and I want LP spreaders.
 
Does having faster ram help with say running a FPS game in a RAMDisk? Also will running a game in RAMDisk make it play better (in anyway at all) compared to just having it installed on a current day SSD?

Just wondering.
 
Oh yeah, even tho I haven't decided whether I'll keep all of my 32G I do agree it's definitely overkill for a vast majority of things. Even Photoshop doesn't really need that much unless you're working on 1GB files, which isn't very common.

My use of VMs isn't very hardcore either ands that's one of the few other common usage cases that can really use gobs of RAM... Only reason I'm actually considering keeping it is for editing 4K video, pretty sure it'll help then.

I don't have a 4K ILC body yet but I probably will by year's end... Being able to leave pretty much anything open anytime is also somewhat appealing. :p Even 16GB is usually enough for that tho.
 
I'd say get the faster ram and try to tighten timings. It seemed to work for me. I wasn't able to get huge improvements but every little bit helps. Depending on your use of course.
 
Pure-Platinum-190 said:
Does having faster ram help with say running a FPS game in a RAMDisk? Also will running a game in RAMDisk make it play better (in anyway at all) compared to just having it installed on a current day SSD?

Just wondering.
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Not in traditional FPS (i.e. Battlefield). It may reduce load times between different areas in open world games like GTA.
 
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