Overclocking, Gaming & RAM Question

[robinson92]

I've been doing a bit of research into OCing for a system I am thinking of building for Intels' Sandybridge and have read that for OCing ram doesn't 'really' factor into OCing anymore, unless it bottlenecks your system. I have read that 1600MHz ram should do fine for most OCing, however I am looking to get a Corsair Dominator kit, the CMT8GX3M4A1866C9 (4*2GB 1866MHz) So thats 4 sticks giving me 8GBs. I want to know if this is a tab overkill for the system, or if I need something a little stronger. For the system I am looking at an Asus Maximus IV series mobo, an i7 2600 cpu and a couple of ati 68/6900 GPU's.

[CM96]

The CPU you are looking at (i7 2600) is this the standard 2600, the 2600S or the 2600K?

Reason I'm asking is because the Sandy Bridge models (except the "K" variants) will only overclock an extra 2-3% over stock IIRC. So unless you're looking to buy a K version any overclocking will be seriously hobbled. But even if you do buy a 2600K (for example) you'd only really need 1333MHz or so RAM since you'd be overclocking via the multiplier anyway.

Also the motherboard you want (Maximus IV) won't work with Sandy Bridge CPUs (completely different socket & chipset).

[Crystal Skullz]

If its a gaming rig your building then yes 8gigs of RAM is overkill in my opinion, I run http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?...ducts_id=15895
myself and thats more than enough for what I need, there isn't even a game out that will utilize 6gigs of RAM. It all depends on how badly you multi task while your playing games, the more programs your running at the same time while gaming then the more RAM you will use.

[robinson92]

Maximus IV are for 1155 pins http://www.guru3d.com/news/asus-maxi...-sandy-bridge/
And yes a K version
And I need Dual Channel

[CM96]

Originally Posted by robinson92

Maximus IV are for 1155 pins http://www.guru3d.com/news/asus-maxi...-sandy-bridge/

Ah so it is. My bad for going off the top of my head & not researching it.

And yes a K version
And I need Dual Channel

I see. But as with the above poster I believe that 8GB RAM would be overkill for gaming (unless you do a heap of multitasking).

[robinson92]

NPS I had to search far and wide to find out about them earlier this year... It might be worth mentioning that I will be using the PC for an IT/Gaming uni corse, so I will be using a lot of programs at once