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Xtreme DDR

imaswitcheryeah

imaswitcheryeah

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jan 20, 2003
104
0
Brooklyn, NY
Xtreme DDR on Macs?

Check out this high-performance memory:

Xtreme DDR

Looks to be some really good stuff. They take pre-manufactured memory such as Samsung (which I heard is one of the best memory chip makers) and test each module for the highest possible stability. Each one comes with aluminum heat spreaders standard. The cost of a 512 MB PC2700 stick isn't much more than a generic brand that you would buy in a retail store. I found some prices around $135-$160. ALOT cheaper than what is sold on the Apple online store ($250).

The slowest memory they make is PC2700, so any Mac that uses DDR with a 133 sys. bus can't truly benifit. Although it would work, it wouldn't operate at 333 MHz. On XtremeDDR's support section of their website(XtremeDDR support), they have a chart of tested motherboards that are verified to support this memory. Of course their is no any-kind-of-something-Apple. I wrote an email to XtremeDDR asking if these can be installed into a Mac and they replied saying that they have no way of testing their memory on Mac's because they test using a Windows program.

So, my question is:

Has anyone installed this memory in their DDR Mac??

I like having the best components possible in my machine, and this is the best DDR memory I can find for my Power Mac. Any help would be much appreciated!!

Thanks,
-Dan
 
Even if it is better, you won't see any performance increase unless you are overclocking the bus. That is no easy task on a Mac, but on a PC, it is as simple as messing with the BIOS. I see no compelling reason to get this for a Mac.
 
I guess I forgot to mention that I will be "overclocking" the bus. I wan't to put this in my MDD 867, which has the 133 bus. I will be changing the bus to 167 as shown here.

Looks like I may have to test out if the XtremeDDR memory works myself. ;)
 
well, even for that overclock, you don't need any extreme ddr, just regular ps 2700 will work fine.
 
Originally posted by alset
When will Apple ever bring us a faster bus? (not soon)

How noticeable is the difference, regarding RAM?

Dan
Click to expand...

Apple will probably not get much higher bus intill the 970.

We might get one more bump, we will see what that holds.
 
The only bus increases you are going to see are to the front side bus (FSB). Hell, Even Intel's blazing 9^10 Ghz processor, no matter how fast, is still using a 133mhz SYSTEM bus (aka, the speed at which everything else in the system other than the RAM and cache interface with the system controler). We are not going to see any REAL speed increases for any system, be it Windows or Mac until someone decides that it is time to make a faster bus and harddrives and PCI cards and optical drives that can utilize that faster bus. Until then, yes, a FSB increase is better than nothing, but don't think it is going to make your system blaze ahead of anything else out there.
 
I'm not trying to have an insanely fast hot-rod here. I just try to get the most out of my current machine. Then I don't really feel the need to purchase a new machine too soon. My model is the entry-level MDD PowerMac 867. Currently, top-of-the-line is the 1.42 FW800 MDD. By comparison, I'm lagging a bit. I feel the 867 was a great value because there is room for improvement, which won't cost as much as if I would have opted for a faster model. By doing this, I don't feel as compelled to get a new system until some time goes by and something is out that blows me out of the water.

I know I'm not going to see that much of a difference, but every little bit adds up.

I just wanted to know if anyone know's if anyone has tried using Xtreme DDR in their Macs.

Maybe I'm in the wrong forum for this.:rolleyes:
 
Originally posted by imaswitcheryeah
I'm not trying to have an insanely fast hot-rod here. I just try to get the most out of my current machine. Then I don't really feel the need to purchase a new machine too soon. My model is the entry-level MDD PowerMac 867. Currently, top-of-the-line is the 1.42 FW800 MDD. By comparison, I'm lagging a bit. I feel the 867 was a great value because there is room for improvement, which won't cost as much as if I would have opted for a faster model. By doing this, I don't feel as compelled to get a new system until some time goes by and something is out that blows me out of the water.

I know I'm not going to see that much of a difference, but every little bit adds up.

I just wanted to know if anyone know's if anyone has tried using Xtreme DDR in their Macs.

Maybe I'm in the wrong forum for this.:rolleyes:
Click to expand...

Maybe you are but they are probably good. I mean what is the harm it could do?

I think not much.

Anyway. Don't complain about your 867 system I have the iMac 800 MHZ for chistman, not knowing that an iMac update would be 2 months off. bah!
 
sorry if I seemed harsh. I am a little cynical today and just look at the negative of everything (and some of the positive). I understand your feelings about wanting to get the most out of your machine as possible. You think you are lagging in performance, try a 250mhz 603ev processor with EDO RAM! I even have a whole 2MB of VRAM and a ATI Rage II! Heck, I am thinking about clock-chipping it, but I have never soldered to a motherboard and don't want to risk it without someone who has more experiance fixing the physical aspects of a computer to help me. If I were to succeed, I would have a 300Mhz processor!!!!! WOW! Talk about blazing! Anyway, I didn't mean to offend you, and yes, this is probably the best place to ask, so good luck.
 
Geez Louise.

OK, thanks for all your input guys, but don't mistake me saying that I'm not happy with the speed of my computer. All I said was that I now "feel" as though I'm lagging because of the new(er) power macs. Just like you said, Mr. Macman, little did you know there would be an iMac update in 2 months. So, you can understand what I'm saying about the power mac updates.

In no way do I feel my computer is slow. In no way am I complaining. I actually feel much better, knowing you guys have much slower machines than I do. After I put the Xtreeme DDR in my slots, I'll be posting on these forums, like, WAY faster than anyone, you'll see!!:D :p :) ;) :cool: :eek: Gnarly!!

Like, totally dude. Radical.
 
Xeons have a 533 MHz System Bus

Originally posted by KingArthur
The only bus increases you are going to see are to the front side bus (FSB). Hell, Even Intel's blazing 9^10 Ghz processor, no matter how fast, is still using a 133mhz SYSTEM bus (aka, the speed at which everything else in the system other than the RAM and cache interface with the system controler). We are not going to see any REAL speed increases for any system, be it Windows or Mac until someone decides that it is time to make a faster bus and harddrives and PCI cards and optical drives that can utilize that faster bus. Until then, yes, a FSB increase is better than nothing, but don't think it is going to make your system blaze ahead of anything else out there.
Click to expand...

Intel Xeon's appear to have a 533 MHz SYSTEM bus (as opposed to fSb) on the E7505 and E7501 chipsets. From the Intel site:

"Dual Intel Xeon processors with 533 MHz system bus provides up to 4.3 GB/s of available bandwidth. " http://www.intel.com/products/serve...index.htm?iid=ipp_browse+srvrprocess_xeon512&

But I don't know if PCI-X cards and newer HDDs really do utilize the faster bus.

But when Intel says "system" they could really mean fsb... hmmm.
 
Re: Xeons have a 533 MHz System Bus

Originally posted by law guy


Intel Xeon's appear to have a 533 MHz SYSTEM bus (as opposed to fSb) on the E7505 and E7501 chipsets. From the Intel site:

"Dual Intel Xeon processors with 533 MHz system bus provides up to 4.3 GB/s of available bandwidth. " http://www.intel.com/products/serve...index.htm?iid=ipp_browse+srvrprocess_xeon512&

But I don't know if PCI-X cards and newer HDDs really do utilize the faster bus.

But when Intel says "system" they could really mean fsb... hmmm.
Click to expand...

All new Pentium 4s have a 533MHz FSB. The next major revision (Prescott, possibly called Pentium 5) will have an 800MHz FSB, putting it on a par with the PPC970.
 
Re: Xeons have a 533 MHz System Bus

Originally posted by law guy


Intel Xeon's appear to have a 533 MHz SYSTEM bus (as opposed to fSb) on the E7505 and E7501 chipsets. From the Intel site:

"Dual Intel Xeon processors with 533 MHz system bus provides up to 4.3 GB/s of available bandwidth. " http://www.intel.com/products/serve...index.htm?iid=ipp_browse+srvrprocess_xeon512&

But I don't know if PCI-X cards and newer HDDs really do utilize the faster bus.

But when Intel says "system" they could really mean fsb... hmmm.
Click to expand...

Good eyes. I have never seen them use the words "system bus" so many time in one page. This takes some looking into. I will say this, though, that a lot of computer makers and magazines interchange the words "system bus" and "FSB" a lot, so it may just be a way to try and fool the typical consumer and at the same time make intel look better. I'll definately have to get back to you on this.
 
lol. It is just Intel trying to fool us. Check out this site: http://www.intel.com/design/chipsets/e7505/index.htm .

Dual Intel Xeon processors with 533 MHz system bus provides up to 4.3 GB/s of available bandwidth.
Dual DDR266 memory channels provide up to 4.3 GB/s of memory bandwidth.
Click to expand...

DDR channels at 266mhz signify they are operating at the rise and fall of the 133mhz (effectively 266mhz) system bus. The 533Mhz system bus they claim to have is just the same quad-pumped Front Side Bus (i.e. trace cache bus) that they have been using in the regular Intel P4 (remember, 133*4=533). Well, it is no suprise that, yet again, Intel is trying to substitute better sounding words for their higher-end products. Now we can go along with our hating of Intel just like normal;). Thanks for at least giving me yet something else I could look up tonight (I have been reading Ars Technica all day long for fun).
 
Originally posted by KingArthur
lol. It is just Intel trying to fool us. Check out this site: http://www.intel.com/design/chipsets/e7505/index.htm .



DDR channels at 266mhz signify they are operating at the rise and fall of the 133mhz (effectively 266mhz) system bus. The 533Mhz system bus they claim to have is just the same quad-pumped Front Side Bus (i.e. trace cache bus) that they have been using in the regular Intel P4 (remember, 133*4=533). Well, it is no suprise that, yet again, Intel is trying to substitute better sounding words for their higher-end products. Now we can go along with our hating of Intel just like normal;). Thanks for at least giving me yet something else I could look up tonight (I have been reading Ars Technica all day long for fun).
Click to expand...

Good breakdown King. So, when Apple says that the new powermacs have a 167 MHz system bus, using 333 MHz DDR ram, that appears accurate and (help me out here) is in fact faster than an Intel chipset? Now - I keep reading on this site how Apple really isn't using the full potential of the DDR. The Apple site seems to say that they are.

Quote:

"DDR SDRAM allows the system to read and write data to and from memory on both the rising and falling edge of each clock cycle. It delivers 2.7 GBps throughput between main memory and the system controller — twice the throughput of single data rate (SDR) SDRAM, which reads and writes only on the rising edge of the clock cycle. DDR SDRAM increases memory bandwidth not only to the processors, but to all elements of the system. Direct memory access (DMA) allows system elements such as a hard drive controller or a graphics processing unit to send and receive data directly from main memory, without going through the processors. This added memory bandwidth allows system elements to function independently at high data rates, boosting total system performance."

What is the problem with the way Apple uses its DDR and has it been "fixed" in the new powermacs. (sorry to hear about the noise on the revised systems in the new thread on the subject. Apparently, Sony has built some incredibly quite cases/configurations lately... perhaps some Japanese ergonomic know-how should be brought to Apple design?)
 
Originally posted by law guy


Good breakdown King. So, when Apple says that the new powermacs have a 167 MHz system bus, using 333 MHz DDR ram, that appears accurate and (help me out here) is in fact faster than an Intel chipset? Now - I keep reading on this site how Apple really isn't using the full potential of the DDR. The Apple site seems to say that they are.

Quote:

"DDR SDRAM allows the system to read and write data to and from memory on both the rising and falling edge of each clock cycle. It delivers 2.7 GBps throughput between main memory and the system controller — twice the throughput of single data rate (SDR) SDRAM, which reads and writes only on the rising edge of the clock cycle. DDR SDRAM increases memory bandwidth not only to the processors, but to all elements of the system. Direct memory access (DMA) allows system elements such as a hard drive controller or a graphics processing unit to send and receive data directly from main memory, without going through the processors. This added memory bandwidth allows system elements to function independently at high data rates, boosting total system performance."

What is the problem with the way Apple uses its DDR and has it been "fixed" in the new powermacs. (sorry to hear about the noise on the revised systems in the new thread on the subject. Apparently, Sony has built some incredibly quite cases/configurations lately... perhaps some Japanese ergonomic know-how should be brought to Apple design?)
Click to expand...

The problem is not with the System Bus but with the Front Side Bus. The FSB is the controller built onto the CPU that allows it to communicate to the System Bus. The FSB on the current G4 is capable of only single data rate rather than Double Data rate so it can not communicate at the the double speed of the ram therefore no real speed increase. Though the 167MHz bus helps and the fact that the ram has the extra bandwidth keeps it from getting tied up with the Video Card and hard drive and any other subsystem. This allows the cpu to access ram with as much bandwidth as it can use.
 
FUD ALERT

Ok guys and gals...

http://www.intel.com/design/chipsets/linecard.htm

Above link is a comparison of Intel's chipset for their desktops.

DDR266 is double pumped to provide for the 533 system bus.

Some of these chipsets will run at either 533 or 400MHz. Same as the old PC100 or PC133 days...

Even accounting for the fact that most devices do not use all of their potential bandwidth, (ie FireWire 800 doesn't really run at 800) ever. It is still better to have the headroom than not.

Apple does not give us this headroom yet. They are efficient at what they do provide, and I am fairly certain that spec for spec Apple's stuff does run better. ie 133MHz buses compared.

But the bar has been raised.

Motorola obviously doesn't care.

I find it ironic that Apple's savior may very well be the company that defined what a PC is; IBM.
 
So how much of a difference will the 970's 800mhz/900mhz FSB speed make? That would still put it over the system bus... but it would be faster, which is better than slower.

Main question: is it worth waiting till the end of the year to get a new 970, as opposed to a dual 1.42 now?
 
Originally posted by crazzyeddie
So how much of a difference will the 970's 800mhz/900mhz FSB speed make? That would still put it over the system bus... but it would be faster, which is better than slower.

Main question: is it worth waiting till the end of the year to get a new 970, as opposed to a dual 1.42 now?
Click to expand...

If it is only the end of this year, and you can live with what you have now... Then yes, wait for the 970.

Please realize, we are talking out of our arses when we say that the 970 will be here end of 2003. We don't really know that. It truly is just a rumor. We could be stuck with these sucky G4's for another 1-1/2 yrs :(

Otherwise, get the dual 1.42 and enjoy! :)

Bus speed that is 2x faster is a huge difference. Think of difference between a 66MHz bus and a 133MHz bus. Night and day.
 
Originally posted by yzedf
We could be stuck with these sucky G4's for another 1-1/2 yrs :(

Otherwise, get the dual 1.42 and enjoy! :)

Bus speed that is 2x faster is a huge difference. Think of difference between a 66MHz bus and a 133MHz bus. Night and day.
Click to expand...

We could be stuck with the G4's or another Motorola chip much longer. There has been no direct evidence linking the 970 to Apple just conjecture at this point.

The double and quad pumped busses don't acutally give you double and quad rate speeds. Yes there is SOME benefit but no where near as much as might think. Another thing to think about is that the basic PC architechture and Windows relies on the CPU working as a intermediary for all subsystems. If the Video card wants some texture it has to send a signal to the cpu and then the cpu to the hard drive and back again in the same way/route. On a Apple using Direct Memmory Access the Video Card can simply access the hard drive or ram for itself. The same goes for any other subsystem. The firewire transfer can be direct to the hard drive completely bypassing the cpu. This significantly offloads the cpu and therefore the need for a DDR FSB isn't nearly as great as it is with a PC. With a PC it is nearly necessary to have the double or quad pumped bus just to deal with the in/out traffic of the entire system.
 
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