Performance Gaming - 3 or 6 Gigabyte memory ?

The gaming discrepancy between 3 or 6 Gigabyte memory

Out of (my) curiosity I was interested in learning if there would be a measurable performance difference between thee and six GB of memory equipped in our test system.

So here's what we did. We setup our PC at standard test mode:

• Windows Vista SP1 64-bit
• GeForce GTX 285 eVGA SSC edition / FW 181.21
• Core i7 965 @ 3.75 GHz
• Memory Frequency at 1500 MHz

Now we inserted a 3x1 GB OCZ memory kit, clocked it at 1500 MHz with 8-9-9-24 1T timings and measured Far Cry 2 and Crysis WarHEAD at normal image quality settings you would choose as well. Ranging from 1024x768 up-to 2560x1600.

In the second run we took the 2x3 GB Corsair Dominator memory kit, clocked it at the very same 1500 MHz with 8-9-9-24 1T timings again. Let's have a look. First Far Cry 2.

Far Cry 2

Throw your memory back to the year 2004 and the release of the innovative Far Cry on PC. Developer Crytek managed to fashion one of the most convincing and striking locales in all of gaming, and satisfied gamers with the freedom to pass through the landscape and tackle enemies in almost any way they saw fit. You surely remember Jack Carver and that things were about to get seriously messed up for you? Well, tough luck. You are no longer at that deserted tropical island but hop into a jeep and arrive at the sandy savannah surroundings of Africa. And that's a change... as much as you'll no longer run into any mutants, aliens, or any superpowers or psychic powers. Also - you are no longer Jack Carver, you assume the role of one of nine different mercenaries who are embedded in the midst of a brutal civil war which rages in an imaginary African nation.
Everything that goes down is involved in a dirty little bush war in central Africa and you'll have to use a rusty AK-47 and whatever bits of scavenged land mine you can duct-tape together. Two factions struggle for supremacy: the United Front for Liberation and Labour and the Alliance for Popular Resistance, and both are known for blood and control.

Now as you can see, the difference is measurable .. but nominal. Not every or any title will benefit from more memory than 3 GB. But rest assured, future titles definitely will and there will be some games out there that definitely benefit from it.

But let's also have a peek at Crysis WARHEAD again.

Crysis WARHEAD

So here we have the same settings again.

• Level Ambush
• Codepath DX10
• Anti-Aliasing 2x MSAA
• In game Quality mode Gamer

And in the grand scale of things we see very similar behavior. Perhaps we didn't choose the very best titles to support our theory, but none the less, we wanted to check at least two modern games with normal image quality settings that you and I use, and then observe performance differentials among 3GB and 6 GB.