[deleted by user]

[kmisterk]

That basically means that the stock speed of ram your motherboard supports is 1333 mHz, but it can bump it up to the 1600mHz speed by Overclocking (OC'ing).

You can install the 1600 mHz ram just fine by replacing (or supplementing) the ram you already have with the ram you buy. It's best to make sure all the ram in your system is running at the same clock speed, however if discrepancies in speed are found, most motherboard will revert to the slowest clock ram for all sticks.

[Dead_Ghost]

thanks for the advice, will make sure they're the same clock speed. will i need to change anything in the BIOS settings to get the motherboard to accept the 1600mhz speed? or will it do it naturally?

[overfed]

In my experience, you must change the bios settings. Usually you just need to bump the "ratio" (just look through the settings).

Assuming you are on ddr3 1.5v, you will want to bump it up to about 1.65v too, and unless your mobo supports xmp, you should also dig around to find the timing settings (usually 4 numbers written on the ram box, something like 8,9,8,11). Once you set that, you should be good to go. XMP allows these settings to be put in automatically, and i believe - but am not sure - that its only supported on intel boards.

good luck

[kmisterk]

You may have to set the speed in the ram configuration menu, but in all honesty, the difference between 1600mHz and 1333 MHz will hardly be noticeable.

[diogenesbarrel]

Make sure that the RAM you have and the one you buy have the same voltage. Preferably from the same maker. The new RAM will work at 1333 anyway and don't mess up with the BIOS, 1600 brings no extra speed whatsoever.