Upgrading PC133 to DDR266 on k7S5A MB

[Fucamaroo]

I currently have an Athlon XP 2000+ K7S5A Pro MB with 512 MB PC133 SDRAM. When I encode using the XVID codec, task manager shows 100% CPU usage. If I upgrade to DDR266, will my encoding fps increase? I get around 8-16 fps depending on settings - 700*300 vhq = -1, bframes = disabled~3 max, qpel - flip a coin.

My first guess is no, because my CPU usage is at 100% and so the SDRAM can supply data to the CPU (or L1, L2 cache or whatever) fast enough that memery is not a bottleneck.

Then I thought that maybe the cpu runs in a different sort of mode if the memory is DDR or processes it slightly differently (just a wild ass guess). Or maybe the task manager showing 100% cpu usage takes into account more than just 100% of clock cycle utilization.

So, would buying 512MB DDR266MHz RAM speed up encoding?

Thanks
-steve

[grant_h]

I'm not sure if It would speed things up I don't think it will, but I do know that you will need a compleatly different MB, because you can't just simply put DDR into an SDRAM slot and expect it to work, I don't think it will even fit.

[Fucamaroo]

I don't think it will speed up processing either, but my MB really does support both SDRAM and DDR. Just not at the same time...

http://www.ecs.com.tw/products/pd_spec.asp?product_id=269

[smiller667]

Why not borrow a DDR stick from a friend and run a little benchmark using the same amount of memory?

[mrlipring]

ddr will outperform sdr on the same motherboard, in memory intensive things.

like playing games.

or doing a/v stuff. which is nice.

[wmansir]

I did this exact upgrade, 512MB PC133 SDR to 512MB DDR on ECS k7s5a (not a pro). I usually encode with CCE, and I was getting around 1.0 or 1.1 realtime before the upgrade, after I think i got 1.2 or 1.3, so a 10 to 15% increase. I can't really nail it down because I also upgraded my processor a short time later so I'm not too clear on the performance difference the memory upgrade alone made.

However, upgrading from a 12.5Ghz Tbird to a 1.6Ghz XP gave me a much bigger performance boost and cost me around $5 bucks less. So be sure to check out prices and see where you will get the most bang for your buck.

Also, I overclock my system bus to 147Mhz, but I did that with both types of RAM so the performance difference between the memory types is probably the same as a stock system.

[Solo]

can't really nail it down because I also upgraded my processor a short time later so I'm not too clear on the performance difference the memory upgrade alone made

I'd say that the CPU did it as DivX encoding relies on the raw power of the CPU to to the work. But I also see that the FSB also makes a big difference.
I've followed the benchmarks and with the older P4 533 FSB 2.8 Ghz versus the AMD 2800+ Barton the Barton got better frames per second.
BUT I now recently saw a P4 2.4C 800 FSB performing better than the Barton 2800+ so this interests me as I will be swopping the AMD for Pentium soon.

[wmansir]

Oh, the CPU definitely gave me a bigger boost in encoding performance, but I didn't do them at exactly the same time (I upgraded the memory 2 or 3 weeks earlier) so they both gave me a noticeable boost.

[Ramirez]

Dunno how come so many people() fails to recognize how seriously RAM affects overall system performance (and yes ENCODING too lol)

A rule of thumb: Faster RAM=Faster Encoding Times
:P
Fucamaroo: do you self a favor and step into the 21 century,buy your self a stick of low latency DDR RAM and dump your SDRAM modules,(and yes RAM is the biggest bottleneck in your system, believe me, Your Athlon is starved, badly...)

Solo:besides Raw Power of the CPU there are other things which affect performance,Wanna see how seriously encoding times affected by the RAM? Dead easy to prove, Just set your awesome pair of HyperX RAM to CAS2.5 and then run it in DDR266 mode(yeah asynchronously ;))
watch your encoding speed going down drastically.

[Solo]

Solo:besides Raw Power of the CPU there are other things which affect performance,Wanna see how seriously encoding times affected by the RAM? Dead easy to prove, Just set your awesome pair of HyperX RAM to CAS2.5 and then run it in DDR266 mode(yeah asynchronously )
watch your encoding speed going down drastically.

Yeh must settle down now as I have changed my system twice in two months. During which time I have only encoded one movie - so I haven't seen the full potential of the faster memory myself yet. I'm just waiting for my new Abit IC7 mobo tomorrow and then I'm going to run a P4 2.4C @ 3.2 Ghz with FSB at 1.08 Ghz and HyperX @ 2-3-3-7 using 5:4 devider (using watercooling) and I think that should give some pretty good encoding times ... he he ...:D

[Ramirez]

Awesome machine you're building there, I hope you'll share with us some details about encoding times you're getting there as soon as you'll get it up and running.

Sorry if I sounded harsh or something. :)

[Fucamaroo]

Ramirez
Fucamaroo: do you self a favor and step into the 21 century,buy your self a stick of low latency DDR RAM and dump your SDRAM modules,(and yes RAM is the biggest bottleneck in your system, believe me, Your Athlon is starved, badly...)

Keep your panties on there chief.

I did a test with some PC2700 (MB doesn't support that high but its backwards compatible). First number is with the SDRAM and the second number is with PC2700 ram. 195 second clip.

586sec - 545sec (7.0% speed increase)
704sec - 643sec (8.7% speed increase)
685sec - 624sec (8.9% speed increase)
717sec - 561sec (21.7% speed increase)

The first three tests didn't have b-frames enables while the last test had max bframes = 3. So obviously with more B-frames the DDR RAM helps quite a bit.

[Solo]

@ Ramirez

No you never sounded harsh. No problem. All advice most welcomed.
I will most definitely let you guys know about the encoding times.

If you guys want to see the effect of memory including how it relates to Pentium 4 systems check out http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/memory/display/p4-mem.html (THIS) excellent article.
The page regarding DivX encoding is http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/memory/display/p4-mem_4.html (here.)

[chemmajik]

Well when I went from CAS3 fsb 138 ddr basically PC ram to PC2700, I'm 200Mhz faster at CAS2, best investment I ever made, no crashes ever since with a 420W Thermaltake PFC PSU... Fold & DVD & GAME & MPEG4 24hrs a day....