single stick ram vs dual stick

[bpherbst]

ignoring the fact that a 8gb stick is more valuable than 2 4gb sticks for upgrade reasons. Wouldn't a single stick be a tad more reliable than a setup with dual sticks since they don't have to work together?

 

[Ericloewe]

Yes, but that discussion is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyyyy down in the noise. The important factors are:

• Future expansion (i.e. is it easier if you don't fill up slots with lower-density DIMMs?)
• Memory bandwidth (i.e. do you need dual-, triple-, quad- or hex-channel operation, if applicable to your platform?)
• Cost (i.e. is one option significantly cheaper?)

 

[Chris Moore]

ignoring the fact that a 8gb stick is more valuable than 2 4gb sticks for upgrade reasons.

You should tell what hardware you are discussing, always, it helps to give others some frame of reference.

Wouldn't a single stick be a tad more reliable than a setup with dual sticks since they don't have to work together?

Why would that question even enter your mind?

The reliability of two (or more) sticks of memory working together is one of the reasons it is usually suggested to buy the memory in sets or at least buy the same exact kind you already have, if you are upgrading. The memory, if it is properly matched, should work as reliably as a single module, but there is always the possibility of getting a bad module and it does increase troubleshooting complexity when you need to figure out which stick of memory is causing an error.

Are you looking to buy hardware to build a system?

 

[kdragon75]

The memory, if it is properly matched, should work as reliably as a single module

Not true. One unit is half as likely to fail as two. Granted I have seen kingston of having a 500 year MTBF... So if you have 8 sticks that's still 60+ years!

 

[Chris Moore]

Not true. One unit is half as likely to fail as two.

Sure, it happens, memory sometimes goes bad and the more memory modules you have, the more memory modules can go bad, kind of like hard drives. That is why I said it SHOULD work reliably. Anything can break, even diamonds can be cut.
Troubleshooting memory faults is a pain, but it doesn't happen often, in my experience, with modern hardware. Where I work, we have an installed base of a little more than 2000 workstations, all with Xeon CPUs and ECC memory, and it is an unusual situation to have one with a memory fault. The Dell systems will usually tell you which slot the error is coming from, but the HP system firmware is not as nice. In the last six years, I have only had to deal with three systems that needed memory replaced due to a failure, and in the data-center, we only had one server that threw a fault and needed a replacement module.
I wouldn't configure a system with a single module just to avoid the possibility that two modules are more likely to fail.

So if you have 8 sticks that's still 60+ years!

So, if you only have one computer, you might not see a single memory failure in your lifetime. That doesn't sound like a big problem.