N4: DDR or PC133?

Having to upgrade the PC with a new motherboard, I wonder what's to prefer between: 1) 128 Mb RAM DDR 2) 256 Mb RAM PC133 Are 128 Mb of RAM enough for N4? Could the best performances of DDRs make up for the less amount of memory or 256 of PC133 are to be preferred? Steve

In general, I'll take more memory. I don't know about N4, but I've read that Falcon 4 can take advantage of 256 MB. I'm excited about DDR, but I'll wait for the platform to mature and the prices to drop. The KT133A is at least a third generation PC133 chipset (after KX133 and KT133), whereas the the Apollo Pro 266, AMD 760, ALi MAGiK 1, etc. have to be considered "1.0" at best. I've heard that some AMD 760 motherboards can only support DDR 100. Also, whereas Crucial sells CL2 PC133 for less than $.50 / MB, they don't yet sell DDR 133. Corsair DDR 133 is over $1 / MB. Take a look at these articles: The KT133A Decision, Part 1 <http://www.aceshardware.com/Spades/read.php?article_id=25000179> Compares KT133, KT133A, and AMD 760 with USAF, NASCAR Heat, F1 2000, and MBTR. VIA�s KT133A Socket-A Chipset: AMD 760 Performance without DDR SDRAM <http://anandtech.com/printarticle.html?i=1386> Compares KT133, KT133A, AMD 760, and i815. DDR SDRAM - A First Glance <http://www.realworldtech.com/page.cfm?ArticleID=RWT012101000000> Conventional benchmarks of PC133, DDR 100, and DDR 133. "steve" <[email hidden]> wrote:

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>Having to upgrade the PC with a new motherboard, I wonder what's to prefer >between: > >1) 128 Mb RAM DDR >2) 256 Mb RAM PC133 > >Are 128 Mb of RAM enough for N4? >Could the best performances of DDRs make up for the less amount of memory or >256 of PC133 are to be preferred?

-- Jon Willeke <j dot willeke at verizon dot net>

From the benchmarks I'm seeing, the KT133a boards are performing close to DDR based systems. Just make sure you get the Stepping "C" DDR Athlon processor to go with it. DDR RAM is overpriced right now, IMHO. -Larry "steve" <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:d_or6.33094$[email hidden]...

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> Having to upgrade the PC with a new motherboard, I wonder what's to prefer > between: > > 1) 128 Mb RAM DDR > 2) 256 Mb RAM PC133 > > Are 128 Mb of RAM enough for N4? > Could the best performances of DDRs make up for the less amount of memory

or

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> 256 of PC133 are to be preferred? > > Steve > > > >

Hi Steve, I don't know about the extra performance the DDR will give you, but yesterday I just upgraded from 128MB to 384MB PC133. (kinda overkill, but at prices these days...) Previously I used to get the occasional stutter in N4 after playing for a while. Paused randomly, but maybe once every 45 sec or so. Now with the extra memory it never stutters at all. Smoooooth as glass... <g> The rest of my system specs, in case it makes a difference: P3 1000MHz, GeForce2 GTS, Turtle Beach Montego, buncha hard disk space, etc, etc... ...Klinn "steve" <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:d_or6.33094$[email hidden]...

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> Having to upgrade the PC with a new motherboard, I wonder what's to prefer > between: > > 1) 128 Mb RAM DDR > 2) 256 Mb RAM PC133 > > Are 128 Mb of RAM enough for N4? > Could the best performances of DDRs make up for the less amount of memory

or

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> 256 of PC133 are to be preferred? > > Steve > > > >