[1Wolf]

Daisy Chain motherboard (ASUS Dark Hero)
AMD 5000 series CPU (AMD 5900X)

2x32 DDR4 3600 18-22-22-42
vs.
2x16 DDR4 3600 16-16-16-36

Outside of overclocking and speaking only purely on "out-of-the-box, set to XMP and go!" PC performance in FPS game benchmarks, how much of a performance difference is there if you move from 2x16 up to 2x32?

 

[Asmodian]

Hugely depends on the workflow... but I don't understand. Where did you find 32GB 3600C16 DIMMS?!

That 2x16 is really slow too.

 

[1Wolf]

Hugely depends on the workflow... but I don't understand. Where did you find 32GB 3600C16 DIMMS?!

That 2x16 is really slow too.

Ack. My bad. When I entered the timings I got them flip flopped between kits. It was the 2x16GB Kit that should have shown the C16. I edited the original post. Sorry for the confusion.

However, it appears that Crucial makes 32GB 3600C16 DIMMS.
Crucial Ballistix RGB 64GB Kit (2 x 32GB) DDR4-3600 16-18-18-38

With regards to the workflow: Gaming

 

[Asmodian]

Absolutely no reason to get 64GB of slow memory over 32GB of fast memory.

Most of the discussion is around 16GB v.s. 32GB of ram for gaming, once you have 32GB of RAM the only improvement you can make is faster not more capacity. That is very slow memory too, it would be a shame to pair it with a 5900X.

 

[1Wolf]

Absolutely no reason to get 64GB of slow memory over 32GB of fast memory.

Most of the discussion is around 16GB v.s. 32GB of ram for gaming, once you have 32GB of RAM the only improvement you can make is faster not more capacity. That is very slow memory too, it would be a shame to pair it with a 5900X.

Thanks Asmodian. So that is sort of what I'm trying to get a feel for. If you look at those two RAM kits you see 3600 16-16-16-36 vs. 3600 18-22-22-42. For gaming, you see one of those as "Very Slow Memory". I'm trying to learn to be able to look at those memory kits and be able to say "This one is very slow memory" and "This one is good fast memory".

I'm trying to get a frame of reference here. If we were talking about fast cars we might be talking 0-60 times or quarter mile times. If we were talking about the weather and I said that it was 29 below zero in my area and it was in the 70's where you are at we'd know that yours is a pleasant average temperature and mine is WAY colder. But if your area was in the 70's and mine was in the 50's we'd know that my area is just a little colder.

So I'm just trying to learn to better understand how those timings translate to real-world speed. I really wanted to put 64Gigs in this machine but I don't want to pay a big performance penalty. I watched a video from hardware unboxed on YouTube about memory speeds and they seemed to indicate only a small difference in FPS due to timings on Zen 3. So if the difference is something like just 4-5 FPS in most games to go with the 64 Gigs with worse timing then its worth it to me. If the difference is going to be large and I'm going to see 10-20 FPS difference then maybe I need to stick with 32 Gigs.

I really want to go with 64 Gigs and don't mind paying a small or tiny performance penalty in FPS when gaming. But if its a medium or large performance penalty in FPS in gaming then its not worth it to me.

 

[mattliston]

Absolutely no reason to get 64GB of slow memory over 32GB of fast memory.

Most of the discussion is around 16GB v.s. 32GB of ram for gaming, once you have 32GB of RAM the only improvement you can make is faster not more capacity. That is very slow memory too, it would be a shame to pair it with a 5900X.

Quit making poor determinations for people. This kit would be perfectly fine to use.


3600 CL16 versus CL18 is next to impossible to see from the "drivers seat" of the computer.


If someone wants 64gb, let them get it.

This is several threads now trying to make people think that 1-2 timing jumps on CAS makes a big difference.

 

[mattliston]

If people want to see a real difference, they wont even find it at 3200 CL14 versus 3200 CL22 (big timing jump there).

This was tested during ECC ram testing on youtube by LTT. Not the greatest channel for testing things, but they still gave a great perspective on why bandwidth is more important than "timing latency"

 

[o1dschoo1]

If people want to see a real difference, they wont even find it at 3200 CL14 versus 3200 CL22 (big timing jump there).

This was tested during ECC ram testing on youtube by LTT. Not the greatest channel for testing things, but they still gave a great perspective on why bandwidth is more important than "timing latency"

....... yall are asking the wrong questions. What does he need 64 gb of ram vs 32 for. With 32 gb of ram i can render in hand brake game watch youtube and have 6 tabs of chrome open at the same time

 

[8800GT]

In terms of out of box performance? The dual 32gb kit would be fine. You'd lose a few ns of latency but unless you are utilizing professional applications , the difference won't be huge. 16 vs 32 is a different conversation because then you have to factor in dual rank vs single rank; ryzen seems to really like dual rank memory. Ddr4 is cheap atm. If you want 64 , go for it. But generally 32GB is still more than enough for most people.

To explain it like you asked, I guess it would be like this. The memory has the same max speed (say, a governor) it can reach, but the c16 has better torque and gear ratios. If you were to line them up next to each other on a 4 mile course, they'd probably finish at the same speed (bandwidth). But the c16 would get there first, purely because of its inherent advantages in latency. Having said that, memory works so quickly it's more like a 100 yard dash over and over. The c16 car will win again, and again, and again because it's just faster at processing information and getting it to the cpu.

 

[1Wolf]

Quit making poor determinations for people. This kit would be perfectly fine to use.


3600 CL16 versus CL18 is next to impossible to see from the "drivers seat" of the computer.


If someone wants 64gb, let them get it.

This is several threads now trying to make people think that 1-2 timing jumps on CAS makes a big difference.

If people want to see a real difference, they wont even find it at 3200 CL14 versus 3200 CL22 (big timing jump there).

This was tested during ECC ram testing on youtube by LTT. Not the greatest channel for testing things, but they still gave a great perspective on why bandwidth is more important than "timing latency"

Thank you SOOOOO much. That is exactly the type of info I'm looking for. So you think the difference would only be a very few FPS and not anything significant.

I really want to go with 64 Gigs and don't mind paying a small or tiny performance penalty in FPS when gaming. But if its a medium or large performance penalty in FPS in gaming then its not worth it to me.

Just as some quick background. I use my machine for 4K gaming and VR flight sims which is really really really FPS hungry. You need every ounce of horsepower you can get. On the other hand, I use my machine for alot of other things too. Video editing, rendering, 3D stuff, virtual machines, software development, on and on. Its MAIN use is gaming though. The last time I built a machine the common advice was "You don't need more than 16 Gigs for gaming and most tasks so you'll unlikely ever need 32 and thats nuts!". Before that it was "Why do you need 8 gigs of RAM? 4 is all you'll ever need?" on and on. I built that machine with 16 and then when I upgraded to 32 just 3 months later alot of various stuff I use that machine for got WAY better. My only regret was not going with 32 to begin with but then, the popular opinion was "You'll never need more than 16". I'm just trying not to make the same mistake I made the last time I built a machine. However, once again, if the "price" is a significant FPS performance penalty then I'd much rather roll the dice on 32 Gigs getting me by. If the performance penalty in my VR Flight sims is neglible for 64 gigs then thats what I'd definitely prefer to go with. Its not a huge price premium between 32 gigs and 64.

....... yall are asking the wrong questions. What does he need 64 gb of ram vs 32 for. With 32 gb of ram i can render in hand brake game watch youtube and have 6 tabs of chrome open at the same time

Not the wrong questions. For sake of this discussion it doesn't really matter what I need 64 Gigs for. I'm not trying to evaluate whether I need or want 64 Gigs. I'm trying to evaluate what the performance price in terms of FPS in my flight sims and 4K gaming might be if I went with 64 over 32.

In terms of out of box performance? The dual 32gb kit would be fine. You'd lose a few ns of latency but unless you are utilizing professional applications , the difference won't be huge. 16 vs 32 is a different conversation because then you have to factor in dual rank vs single rank; ryzen seems to really like dual rank memory. Ddr4 is cheap atm. If you want 64 , go for it. But generally 32GB is still more than enough for most people.

To explain it like you asked, I guess it would be like this. The memory has the same max speed (say, a governor) it can reach, but the c16 has better torque and gear ratios. If you were to line them up next to each other on a 4 mile course, they'd probably finish at the same speed (bandwidth). But the c16 would get there first, purely because of its inherent advantages in latency. Having said that, memory works so quickly it's more like a 100 yard dash over and over. The c16 car will win again, and again, and again because it's just faster at processing information and getting it to the cpu.

Thanks 8800GT. Thats awesome and very helpful. I've been watching YouTube videos and reading articles like crazy. I just haven't found anything so far where someone compares 2x32 DIMMS vs. 2x16 DIMMS in FPS for 4K gaming on a mobo like mine with a Zen 3 CPU. That doesn't mean its not out there, just means I haven't found a good one yet. I did find the aforementioned Hardware Unboxed video that said what you guys have said so far - that the timings on Zen 3 seemed like they didn't make a huge deal. That was a great video and very helpful.

My problem was that while shopping for memory I see that the timings are not as good and looser for the 64 gig kits and I had no way of judging what type of effect that might have on my gaming. Whether it was going to be just a few FPS and fairly negligible or whether it was going to be significant.

 

[mattliston]

....... yall are asking the wrong questions. What does he need 64 gb of ram vs 32 for. With 32 gb of ram i can render in hand brake game watch youtube and have 6 tabs of chrome open at the same time

Had 128gb of ram in the last server mahcine I built. Never saw usage over 11gb.

Still went for it. 8 sticks looks good too on a motherboard lol.


I never see areason to question people with the capacity they are looking for.

YOU (not you specifically, but any onlooker versus the potential buyer) never know if a machine is gonna be built and left for 5-10 years.


Im glad I bought 32gb of ECC ram for my current machine. Could have gone with only 16. Still never seen more than 3-5gb of ram used up.

Still gonna put at least 32gb onto any mahcine I build in the future.


You never know when software is gonna turn around, and make use of ram capacity.


Look at how long people recommended 4gb and 8gb in the older machines. 16gb is now the current "normal" recommendation. Once that goes up to 32gb (quite easy with DDR5 right around the corner), people are gonna wonder why they are reading old posts whining about people using more than 16gb

 

[o1dschoo1]

Had 128gb of ram in the last server mahcine I built. Never saw usage over 11gb.

Still went for it. 8 sticks looks good too on a motherboard lol.


I never see areason to question people with the capacity they are looking for.

YOU (not you specifically, but any onlooker versus the potential buyer) never know if a machine is gonna be built and left for 5-10 years.


Im glad I bought 32gb of ECC ram for my current machine. Could have gone with only 16. Still never seen more than 3-5gb of ram used up.

Still gonna put at least 32gb onto any mahcine I build in the future.


You never know when software is gonna turn around, and make use of ram capacity.


Look at how long people recommended 4gb and 8gb in the older machines. 16gb is now the current "normal" recommendation. Once that goes up to 32gb (quite easy with DDR5 right around the corner), people are gonna wonder why they are reading old posts whining about people using more than 16gb

for gaming you wont need 64 gb for the next 10 years lol. so unless hes doing production aka asking what hes using the machine for its flat out pointless to get 64gb. Loosing performance ontop of costing more money. Gonna pay more to have a slower system thats on you my friend.

 

[o1dschoo1]

Thank you SOOOOO much. That is exactly the type of info I'm looking for. So you think the difference would only be a very few FPS and not anything significant.

I really want to go with 64 Gigs and don't mind paying a small or tiny performance penalty in FPS when gaming. But if its a medium or large performance penalty in FPS in gaming then its not worth it to me.

Just as some quick background. I use my machine for 4K gaming and VR flight sims which is really really really FPS hungry. You need every ounce of horsepower you can get. On the other hand, I use my machine for alot of other things too. Video editing, rendering, 3D stuff, virtual machines, software development, on and on. Its MAIN use is gaming though. The last time I built a machine the common advice was "You don't need more than 16 Gigs for gaming and most tasks so you'll unlikely ever need 32 and thats nuts!". Before that it was "Why do you need 8 gigs of RAM? 4 is all you'll ever need?" on and on. I built that machine with 16 and then when I upgraded to 32 just 3 months later alot of various stuff I use that machine for got WAY better. My only regret was not going with 32 to begin with but then, the popular opinion was "You'll never need more than 16". I'm just trying not to make the same mistake I made the last time I built a machine. However, once again, if the "price" is a significant FPS performance penalty then I'd much rather roll the dice on 32 Gigs getting me by. If the performance penalty in my VR Flight sims is neglible for 64 gigs then thats what I'd definitely prefer to go with. Its not a huge price premium between 32 gigs and 64.



Not the wrong questions. For sake of this discussion it doesn't really matter what I need 64 Gigs for. I'm not trying to evaluate whether I need or want 64 Gigs. I'm trying to evaluate what the performance price in terms of FPS in my flight sims and 4K gaming might be if I went with 64 over 32.



Thanks 8800GT. Thats awesome and very helpful. I've been watching YouTube videos and reading articles like crazy. I just haven't found anything so far where someone compares 2x32 DIMMS vs. 2x16 DIMMS in FPS for 4K gaming on a mobo like mine with a Zen 3 CPU. That doesn't mean its not out there, just means I haven't found a good one yet. I did find the aforementioned Hardware Unboxed video that said what you guys have said so far - that the timings on Zen 3 seemed like they didn't make a huge deal. That was a great video and very helpful.

My problem was that while shopping for memory I see that the timings are not as good and looser for the 64 gig kits and I had no way of judging what type of effect that might have on my gaming. Whether it was going to be just a few FPS and fairly negligible or whether it was going to be significant.

at 4k you more than likely wont notice the difference. but same hand flight sims tend to be cpu heavy so its a wash up. I dont play them so im not really any help. Ill leave this to the flight sim boys that really play them

 

[8800GT]

Thank you SOOOOO much. That is exactly the type of info I'm looking for. So you think the difference would only be a very few FPS and not anything significant.

I really want to go with 64 Gigs and don't mind paying a small or tiny performance penalty in FPS when gaming. But if its a medium or large performance penalty in FPS in gaming then its not worth it to me.

Just as some quick background. I use my machine for 4K gaming and VR flight sims which is really really really FPS hungry. You need every ounce of horsepower you can get. On the other hand, I use my machine for alot of other things too. Video editing, rendering, 3D stuff, virtual machines, software development, on and on. Its MAIN use is gaming though. The last time I built a machine the common advice was "You don't need more than 16 Gigs for gaming and most tasks so you'll unlikely ever need 32 and thats nuts!". Before that it was "Why do you need 8 gigs of RAM? 4 is all you'll ever need?" on and on. I built that machine with 16 and then when I upgraded to 32 just 3 months later alot of various stuff I use that machine for got WAY better. My only regret was not going with 32 to begin with but then, the popular opinion was "You'll never need more than 16". I'm just trying not to make the same mistake I made the last time I built a machine. However, once again, if the "price" is a significant FPS performance penalty then I'd much rather roll the dice on 32 Gigs getting me by. If the performance penalty in my VR Flight sims is neglible for 64 gigs then thats what I'd definitely prefer to go with. Its not a huge price premium between 32 gigs and 64.



Not the wrong questions. For sake of this discussion it doesn't really matter what I need 64 Gigs for. I'm not trying to evaluate whether I need or want 64 Gigs. I'm trying to evaluate what the performance price in terms of FPS in my flight sims and 4K gaming might be if I went with 64 over 32.



Thanks 8800GT. Thats awesome and very helpful. I've been watching YouTube videos and reading articles like crazy. I just haven't found anything so far where someone compares 2x32 DIMMS vs. 2x16 DIMMS in FPS for 4K gaming on a mobo like mine with a Zen 3 CPU. That doesn't mean its not out there, just means I haven't found a good one yet. I did find the aforementioned Hardware Unboxed video that said what you guys have said so far - that the timings on Zen 3 seemed like they didn't make a huge deal. That was a great video and very helpful.

My problem was that while shopping for memory I see that the timings are not as good and looser for the 64 gig kits and I had no way of judging what type of effect that might have on my gaming. Whether it was going to be just a few FPS and fairly negligible or whether it was going to be significant.

It won't be more than a few fps. And at 4k, as previously mentioned, perhaps not even that much. Just as a thought, have you considered 2-16x2 kits? You can find some pretty decent c16 3600 16x2 dual rank kits for a decent price. Obviously 4 dimms might limit fclk stability but zen 3 would have no problem at 1800 fclk with 4 sticks.

 

[o1dschoo1]

It won't be more than a few fps. And at 4k, as previously mentioned, perhaps not even that much. Just as a thought, have you considered 2-16x2 kits? You can find some pretty decent c16 3600 16x2 dual rank kits for a decent price. Obviously 4 dimms might limit fclk stability but zen 3 would have no problem at 1800 fclk with 4 sticks.

Hell if going 4 sticks get 4x3600 cl14 best of both worlds.64gb and low latency

 

[8800GT]

Hell if going 4 sticks get 4x3600 cl14 best of both worlds.64gb and low latency

Spoken like a true fellow enthusiast. What's the motto for this site again? Ah yes, the pursuit of performance 😁

 

[Asmodian]

Had 128gb of ram in the last server mahcine I built. Never saw usage over 11gb.

Still went for it. 8 sticks looks good too on a motherboard lol.

Stop trying to convince people there is no downside to getting crap ram. This is Overclock.net advising people who want the highest gaming performance.

Why spend extra money for worse performance? It looks good on the motherboard?

I never see areason to question people with the capacity they are looking for.

Because they think "more is better" without understanding they are trading real performance in games for a bigger number in task manager.

Look at how long people recommended 4gb and 8gb in the older machines. 16gb is now the current "normal" recommendation. Once that goes up to 32gb (quite easy with DDR5 right around the corner), people are gonna wonder why they are reading old posts whining about people using more than 16gb

This is discussing 32 v.s. 64 GB...

Edit:
Timespy benchmarks between my 3600C16 DIMMs running at my tuned timings and at auto timings:
Result (3dmark.com)

Notice the +12.2% on the CPU test from nothing besides memory timings.

It turns out auto-timings are very loose so here is comparing against 19-22-22-42
Result (3dmark.com)

Only +8.2% on the CPU test. Still significant in my opinion but you can decide.

 

[D-EJ915]

Stop trying to convince people there is no downside to getting crap ram. This is Overclock.net advising people who want the highest gaming performance.

Why spend extra money for worse performance? It looks good on the motherboard?



Because they think "more is better" without understanding they are trading real performance in games for a bigger number in task manager.



This is discussing 32 v.s. 64 GB...

Edit:
Timespy benchmarks between my 3600C16 DIMMs running at my tuned timings and at auto timings:
Result (3dmark.com)

Notice the +12.2% on the CPU test from nothing besides memory timings.

It turns out auto-timings are very loose so here is comparing against 19-22-22-42
Result (3dmark.com)

Only +8.2% on the CPU test. Still significant in my opinion but you can decide.

OP asked about XMP settings though so he won't get the benefit from the better kit being able to have better subtiming tuning like your example. If they change their mind and do start tuning more then 2x of the better kit would be better.

 

[1Wolf]

It won't be more than a few fps. And at 4k, as previously mentioned, perhaps not even that much. Just as a thought, have you considered 2-16x2 kits? You can find some pretty decent c16 3600 16x2 dual rank kits for a decent price. Obviously 4 dimms might limit fclk stability but zen 3 would have no problem at 1800 fclk with 4 sticks.

Hell if going 4 sticks get 4x3600 cl14 best of both worlds.64gb and low latency

I had thought about that very thing and had put up another post here a little while ago asking that same question. The results from the memory guru's were pretty much that with a daisy chain topology on my motherboard I'd pay the price with 4x16. After reading those responses and then doing my "homework" and watching some videos from Buildzoid explaining topologies...it makes sense. The opinion from that thread was that I'd be better off with 2x32 then with 4x16 due to that topology and Buildzoid's testing seems to confirm that.

In addition to the topology issue above, some have also told me that 4 dual-rank DIMMS of 16 is alot to ask of the memory controller, even though Zen3's memory controller is stronger.

So 2 DIMMS of 16 or 2 DIMMS of 32 seemed to be the way to go for my particular motherboard.

If any of that is way off base in your eyes, you'll have to forgive me as I'm trying to wrap my noggin' around alot of this. Been learning alot of new stuff lately as I research this

Stop trying to convince people there is no downside to getting crap ram. This is Overclock.net advising people who want the highest gaming performance.

Why spend extra money for worse performance? It looks good on the motherboard?



Because they think "more is better" without understanding they are trading real performance in games for a bigger number in task manager.



This is discussing 32 v.s. 64 GB...

Edit:
Timespy benchmarks between my 3600C16 DIMMs running at my tuned timings and at auto timings:
Result (3dmark.com)

Notice the +12.2% on the CPU test from nothing besides memory timings.

It turns out auto-timings are very loose so here is comparing against 19-22-22-42
Result (3dmark.com)

Only +8.2% on the CPU test. Still significant in my opinion but you can decide.

Thank you Asmodian for going to the effort to post those benchmarks. Seeing real world numbers is REALLY helpful. Thank you!!!!

I noticed that the graphics card clock frequency and memory frequencies are just a smidge different in the results. Does that have any effect on the results? Or does that only apply to the GPU results and has no bearing on the CPU results that you were demonstrating?

 

[Asmodian]

I noticed that the graphics card clock frequency and memory frequencies are just a smidge different in the results. Does that have any effect on the results? Or does that only apply to the GPU results and has no bearing on the CPU results that you were demonstrating?

The GPU was set to exactly the same settings. Any differences recorded are due to how exactly the boot algorithm was behaving when 3DMark recorded the numbers.

In addition to the topology issue above, some have also told me that 4 dual-rank DIMMS of 16 is alot to ask of the memory controller, even though Zen3's memory controller is stronger.

My results are with 4 dual-rank DIMMs of 16GB installed.

Even Zen2 does not seem to mind quad DIMMs as much as expected. If you want to push >1800 fclk (3600) then I would start worrying about it but for a nice safe 3600 with low timings four 16GB 3600C16 B-die DIMMS runs really well for me.

This is a MUCH better option than getting two terrible 32GB DIMMs. The choice relevant to Buildzoid's data is between 32 GB of fast memory (x2) and 64 GB of fast memory (x4). Getting two 32GB 19-22-22-42 DIMMS because two DIMMS makes it easier to hit low timings does not make any sense. The DIMMs themselves won't be able to do it so they will always be much slower than four of the faster DIMMs anyway.