PC Parts Help

[Caeli]

If your motherboard is brand new, it should come with a manual or a book that specifically lists what speed of memory is compatible.

But Crucial's Memory Advisor doesn't require you to install anything separately... the drop-downs allow you to select the motherboard manufacturer and you will eventually end up at a list of compatible memory.

Newegg and Kingston also have similar memory matching services on their sites.

[Sabby]

Looks like it takes 8gb per slot. It's still recommending a lot of different brands, so I'm stuck with my old question of what, if any, difference does that make?

[Moraline]

Is this the board that you got?

GIGABYTE GA-Z77X-UD5H LGA 1155 Intel Z77 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard   $189.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128545

[Sabby]

Yep, that's the one. The detector is recommending pretty much all the ram ever, so I just need to know if there's any traps in picking. I see very basic looking ones that are just a strip of board and flashy stuff with a case.

[Moraline]

For RAM, I suggest:

G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600  $64.99   ((It's a pair of RAM, you could buy 2 of these pairs but the one should be more then enough. I'm a big fan of G.Skill))
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231568

This is the RAM that I suggested earlier.

It's not very expensive and it's a very good quality. You can buy either the one pair or two.

DDR3 1600 <--- That's the part that you look at when buying RAM.

The numbers on the RAM are like processor speeds. The bigger the number the faster it is. Then the RAM also has something called a cas latency - smaller the cas latency the better. G.Skill has very little cas latency.

PS: The fins on it are like a heat sink on a processor, they just help to keep it cool. Cool components work better.

(( Also the one pair gives you 16 GB which is more then enough for anything. Getting two pair for 32 GB is a waste of money unless your doing some really high end graphics animation design or autocad work.))

[Chris Brady]

If you can easily afford an SSD they are great. The load up times on Windows start up is amazing.

However, there are drawbacks. A lot of them are duds and they have a nasty habit of crashing frequently - keep it in mind(back up your data.)

Also many motherboards need firmware updates to run the SSD's properly (it can sometimes make it look like the SSD is failing when it's not.)

As for RAM, do you know what your looking for already? If you do then as far as brands go, I recommend G.Skillz

There's also a size issue.  They don't have much space as regular HDDs as of yet.  So I suggest keeping the SSD for your operating system, and a back up for anything else.

[Moraline]

I forgot to mention that you can use any DDR3 RAM with a lower number then 1600 on it. However, it will slow everything down and I recommend against it.

So if you have some DDR3 RAM right now that you can use and it's less then a 1600, go ahead and use it until you can order the new RAM.