Is there a way to enhance the memory capacity on your AMD system?
Is there a way to enhance the memory capacity on your AMD system?
I own a PC built around late 2021. The only modifications I've made are with the graphics card. I haven't altered the motherboard because I don't want to disrupt everything. Changing it would be too time-consuming. I also wouldn't switch my CPU to the AMD 7000 series, nor would I upgrade the storage for similar reasons. I'm sticking with the same storage setup as well. Back then, I recalled that 3600 MHz was ideal for AMD CPUs. I spent £270 on a 32GB (2x16GB) G.Skill Trident Z Royal 3600 MHz CL16. With the introduction of DDR5, prices for DDR4 RAM have dropped significantly, so it might be worth looking for better deals on faster RAM. What RAM speed would give you the best performance now? Estimates suggest around 3%, 5% or even 30% improvement depending on the increase. Current specs: AMD Ryzen 9 16-core 5950X CPU, Artic Freezer 2 AIO, Asus ROG Strix X570-F Gaming, Nvidia RTX 4090 Zotac Trinity, and a 32GB memory package.
Top performance RAM for Ryzen 5000 is around 2x16GB 3800 CL14. These bundles are quite costly—often exceeding $300 for the memory alone—and won’t offer much more than the 3600 CL16 kit you’re using, possibly a slight improvement of about 5%. It’s hardly noticeable. Consider investing in a Zen 4 upgrade instead. Mid-range DDR4 prices have dropped, but high-end options stay similarly priced.
It's a bit complicated. They will likely work, getting Ryzen 5000 series CPUs to run memory speeds of 4500+ isn't really all that difficult on a decent motherboard (my personal record is 4800 CL15 to boot and run benchmarks), but the problem you're gonna run into is the FCLK ends up desynced which causes a massive latency and bandwidth penalty. If you can clock the memory up high enough you can sometimes get it to scale to higher memory bandwidth numbers, but you're almost certainly gonna have higher latency than a decent timings 3600 setup. Plus there is the whole single rank vs. dual rank argument, where if you want good timings at high speeds you want to get Samsung B die, and to get speeds above 4000MT/s to even boot you need to have single rank sticks which means you'll be running 16GB of RAM in total. Basically, speeds above 3800 are almost certainly gonna be desynced, and desynced Ryzen is next to impossible to get to match synced Ryzen.
F4-3600C16D-32GTRS Trident Z DDR4-3600 CL16-16-16-36 1.35V 32GB RAM Module
For trying to boost your RAM speed, a 3800 CL14 chip can likely run with sufficient power if the voltage is adequate.