memory won't mind A64 or P4, will they?

it minds, mostely the chipset.

For example, where on most configs 2 2-2-5 is the fasted, on an Nforce2 platform 2-2-2-11 is the fastest..

There's a lot of mem that runs on a P4 that will not on an amd64.

What'd happened to JEDEC standard?

I used to make CHIPS, and I never ran production base on what the market needs (funny to say this) rather on the "yield factor".

The same reason Intel is making money and AMD is losing; high yield versus low yield factor. It is the same in making memory chips. Not many manufacturers but a lot of sorters; example Corsair buys the high end high yield production runs for it's high end "re-packaged" products.

If you look into the Taiwan Board makers' recommended memory; they focus on the markers or the repacker, i.e. Samsung, Micron, Infineon make chips; others are just buying and repacking business.

Besides, I thought latency is no longer the factor rather the bandwidth has become more the bottleneck. The Hyper Transport in A64 allows the increase of bandwidth as much as P4 800MHz dual channel did; as it stands fast timing has become a very minor issue. I may well be totally wrong.

you are:)

Hummm...

Using my own value system, I translate the chart to conclude approximately >20% better performance in games with tight timing, right?

This is not a small margin. I'd better gear up into the game world of today ..... way behind in this catagory.

I made the right decision to hang around with you guys.

on my A64 setup, the PC4200 1/1 was slower then PC3200/2-2-2-5 3/4.
so timing are still important.

I'd say more like 5% max. IMO timings are vastly overrated for the normal computer users but us hardware nuts can't seem to be happy with anything less than the best.

Well, I'm from the "old school". I justify everything with ROI (return of investmen). You are not talking "small" amount of money with the memory. I paid $84 for the pair of PC3200 Apacer which could be run at 520 Mhz; $64 of the 512 single stick PC2700 again Apacer at 200Mhz.

There is an old saying " you pay a high price for being EXTREME".

which would be better for amd socket 939 setup?

OCZ Platinum PC-3200 1024MB Timings 2-2-3-5
or
OCZ EB Platinum PC3500DDR 1024MB Kit Timings 2.5-3- 2-8
or
CORSAIR PC3200 CAS2 HSP LL 1024 mb

...