Memory slot population and performance

[Nemesis]

I'm on the verge of an upgrade to something very much like the following:

3.0GHz P4 / 800MHz FSB
Abit IC7-G I875 'Canterwood' Mobo
Thermalright SLK-900 HSF with 80mm Fan

My question is this... I intend to get 2 x Corsair XMS3500 memory modules for this setup, and wondered if 2 x 512Mb DIMMs were faster than 4 x 256Mb DIMMs?

The reason I ask is because this setup is not cheap, and going for 2 x 256Mb for now and getting another 2 x 256Mb would help with the finances... but only if performance is similar to 2 x 512Mb.

If it matters - I intend to overclock this setup, but not to insane levels.

Any advice would be appreciated!

[Greg]

Unless things have changed in the last 2 years, the last time I saw that exact test, there was NO performance difference between the 256 and 512mb modules. Any reasons you can think of like data being packed smaller or closer, like on a hard disk, doesn't happen.

[dohcmark8]

No, you will not gain anything from having 2 sticks in your computer performance-wise, unless your motherboard supports dual channel ddr, otherwise, the only reason to have 2 sticks would be so if 1 stick died and you rma it, you would still have the other stick to run your computer with.

[Nemesis]

Thanks for the replies. It seems that there are a few issues with memory and canterwood boards, so I'll sit it out for a couple of weeks to let the dust settle.
I'm still leaning towards the Abit, with 2 x 512Mb sticks, which I can now afford as the IC7 is only UKP128.00 - bargain!