Computer Advice

[Samw]

Originally Posted by Richer

Oh... and yeah, I basically assumed that any mobo made in the past two years utilize dual channel ram... probably something I shouldn't have assumed.

-Richer

Most newer boards yeah but many many entry/mid level systems still utilize single channel. That's clear when you look at the products page of many computer stores and motherboard manufacturer webpages (ASUS and DELL for example).

http://www1.ca.dell.com/content/prod...HS1&l=en&s=dhs

http://www.a-power.com/sys/index.html

http://www.sonexpc.com/?mod=system

http://www.ncix.com/ncixpc/

A buyer still should watch out for it and understand it. I don't think we can assume that its automatically dual channel just because the technology has been there for 2 years. Also, even though the motherboard supports dual channel memory doesn't mean the user knows about it and knows to buy 2 sticks of RAM. If a user is asking for advice, we shouldn't assume he knows all about it in my opinion. It doesn't sound like Scales needs a high end computer so a mid-entry would do fine or he may very well go for the challenge and build his own. So this info could be handy if he hasn't kept up with the last 2 years. Lastly, if dual channel was an automatic, there wouldn't be any point to advertise "Single Channel" and "Dual Channel" in the computer ads.