Memory options for the new 20 inch iMac

[bumfilter]

Hello all,

I'm buying some memory for my new iMac but I'm not getting it from Apple.

As I'm in the UK, I'm going for memory from Crucial (if you know of anyone better, please let me know).

Anyway, there are two options, one is slightly more expensive but I was just wondering what the difference was and which one to go for. I don't really care about the price difference, just what the benefit may be.

Option 1:

DDR2 PC2-4200 CL=4 UNBUFFERED NON-ECC DDR2-533 1.8V 128Meg x 64

£82.24 inc. VAT

Option 2:

DDR2 PC2-5300 CL=5 UNBUFFERED NON-ECC DDR2-667 1.8V 128Meg x 64

£86.94 inc. VAT


Thanks if you can help explain it!

 

[Bear]

Go with the DDR2-4200 - it's what Apple sells.

Also, at the same memory bus speed (and DDR2-5300 will run at the bus speed of the -4200 in the iMac). It doesn't matter if the memory can go faster.

Now, the other critical measurement is the CL - it's the number of clock cycles it takes to access memory. The lower number is better, so the CL=4 (-4200) will perform better than the CL=5 memory (-5300).

Save the few dollars get the DDR2-4200

 

[bumfilter]

Great, thanks for your help!