what's the difference?

[oceanmajk]

I've got a K9N SLI Platinum board. I'm looking to upgrade my ram and want the best that's available but need some advice. :confused:

I wanted to get this 8gb kit (http://www.ebyte.com/productdetails/GEIL/GB28GB6400C5QC), but it's only PC2 6400 800Mhz compared to the 4gb kit (http://www.ebyte.com/productdetails/GEIL/GB24GB8500C5QC) that's PC2 8500 1066Mhz.

The K9N board specs show compatibility with 800MHz DDR2-800/PC2-6400 memory, but I'm pretty sure 1066MHz memory wasn't even available when this mobo came out.

8 gigs sounds great and all, but if the speed is slower than the 4gig kit, then I want the faster ram. Speed is more important to me than quantity, so I'm a little confused as what to do.

Can I update the bios to be compatible with the 4gb PC2 8500 1066MHz kit? And would it even be worth the trouble?

Any advice is appreciated... :)

[CGR]

Hello :welcome: to the forums.

Couple of questions for you.

1. Are you running Vista?
2. Do you run any kind of memory intensive apps that require that much memory?

[oceanmajk]

I'm upgrading to Vista once I get more ram. I've got 3 gigs now with XP.

And I do photo and video editing and also programming and database development that takes a lot of memory with intensive data crunching for tables with millions of records and large programs.

I'm also planning on getting an HD video camera so that alone is worth getting the fastest memory and drives available too.

So like i said, 8 gigs sounds nice and all, but I'm not sure i need it if it's going to be slower than 4, but I don't know if I can even get that faster 4 gig kit in the first place

[CGR]

You could look for bios updates for that board, but I have not seen a bios that would increase memory speed compatibility.

You could get the 1066mhz since it should be downwards compatible, meaning it will just run at the slower speed. I would only do that if you plan on upgrading the board soon though.