DDR2 Roundup: Reaching for 667 and Beyond
by Wesley Fink on July 8, 2004 12:09 AM EST- Posted in
- Memory
Conclusion
When we first received DDR2 for testing, we really thought this would be a simple review. Only Corsair and OCZ were talking about DDR2 667 and we assumed that those 2 memories would top everything, if we could find a 925X board to support DDR2 667. The rest would be behind in the pack. OCZ then told us that they planned to devote more time to EB programming of the SPD on their upcoming 667, so our review looked even simpler - Corsair 667 followed by everyone else. That is the problem with assumptions. Test results often turn everything that you expect to find upside down.The most amazing test results came from all the new DDR2 memories that we tested. Amazing, in that even the cheapest value DDR2 ran with complete stability at DDR2 667, which is the next major speed in the DDR2 highway. In addition, every one of the eight memories that we tested in this roundup ran with complete stability at the highest FSB which we could support on any current 925X motherboard - DDR2 686. Most of the tested DDR2 even accomplished this overclocking feat with much better than standard 4-4-4-10 timings and a modest voltage increase to 1.9V from the default 1.8V.
After this roundup, the message about DDR2 is very clear. As it exists today, DDR2 is much better than we expected it to be. Intel could easily move to DDR2 667 timings tomorrow and there would be a whole range of memories available to support that speed.
Perhaps the other half of the message is that this may well be the reason why Intel implemented a 10% overclock lock on the 925X/915 chipsets. No one likes to give away anything for free, and if we were Intel, we might also not want to give customers DDR2 667 performance for free. We can only applaud Abit, Asus, Gigabyte, MSI, and other creative motherboard manufacturers who found ways to bypass the 10% overclock lock. Without this engineering feat, we might never have known that DDR2 667 was already very much a reality.
The new Intel architecture was just launched 2 weeks ago, which makes the incredible performance of the DDR2 memory even more amazing. It is still early, and there will be even more performance DDR2 introduced by the memory companies that cater to Enthusiasts. Over time, you will likely find even higher overclocks at even more aggressive memory timings. For now, we just hope to find a 925X motherboard soon that will allow us to determine what the fastest speed really is for all the DDR2 tested in this roundup.
Right now, Micron memory chips have proved to be the top performers, and these were found in Crucial, Micron, Kingmax, and Corsair memory. The Kingmax may well be the equal of the other 3, but the performance was hampered by our 256MB DIMMs, so we cannot state that with confidence. The Corsair 667, Crucial 533, and Micron 533 were all at the top in every benchmark, so clearly, these 3 are the top performers. While we applaud Corsair for being the first to bring DDR2 667 to market, the reality is that the 667 performed no better than Crucial or Micron 533 in our tests, at any speed that we could reach. Given the fact that the Corsair 667 will likely cost more, we see no reason (with our current test results) to spend more for DDR2 when Crucial/Micron PC2-4300U matches the top performance in every way.
We are pleased to award our Editors Choice for the top DDR2 memory to Crucial PC2-4300U. It is a top performer and the best retail value in this DDR2 roundup. It is exciting when a product rated at DDR2 533 performs at DDR2 667 and DDR2 686 with ease, but every DDR2 memory that we tested accomplished this feat. However, the Crucial PC2-4300U did this with the widest bandwidth and tighest timings found with any memory that we tested. This same Editors Choice applies to Micron PC2-4300U, which is the same memory for the OEM market. Micron and Crucial are to be congratulated for providing the best performance and best value currently available in DDR2 memory.Since Corsair XMS2 5300 appears to be based on the same Micron chips, you can expect similar performance. This may also apply to Kingmax DDR2-533; though, we could not verify performance results using 256MB DIMMs.
Please keep in mind that DDR2 686 was the highest memory speed that we could test with our current 925X test bed. We may well find that the Corsair 667 and upcoming OCZ 667 will easily leave the Crucial and Micron in the dust with memory speeds well beyond DDR2 686. If they do, we will revisit our DDR2 test results. For now, however, it is difficult to complain about DDR2 533 that consistently performs at DDR2 667 and beyond with every DDR2 memory that we have tested.
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betatest3 - Wednesday, August 18, 2004 - link
The DDR2 667 memory is allready available and price is around $245 to $270 for 512mb .The only memory I found was made by Crucial and some Generic by doing a search on pricewatch.com site The $245 memory can be seen here -->http://www.newegg.com/app/viewproductdesc.asp?DEPA...
Hmm.. this DDR2 memory was just made for Intel ??? or maybe in newer motherboards can be used with AMD also ? I would not think a newer memory made by many company's would just be designed for intel especially when alot of manufacturers are jumping over to AMD or can AMD use this 667 memory ?
jiulemoigt - Monday, July 12, 2004 - link
A very funny thought aquired to me after reading the older article on AMD's DDR2 stance. If their waiting for DDR2 667 and the memory is ready but quitly being called 533 does that mean AMD may actully be ready to pull a fast on Intel? Considering the way the chip is designed could the memory controller be flashed to update to the memory controller the same way the other frequencies are set? Oh and I would not buy a LGA socket the pin's being spring loaded just looks to be trouble :o cool articleWesley Fink - Friday, July 9, 2004 - link
FlameDeer -Good catch. P. 6 is corrected to 1032FSB.
FlameDeer - Friday, July 9, 2004 - link
Thanks for quick respond at #10, Wesley! :)Really appreciate your hours and hours of hard work to publish this very first hand thorough DDR2 roundup! :)
A quick look again of this good article, I noticed something need to ask. In page 7 till page 14, is that "258FSB" of 686DDR in every table mean 4 x 258 = "1032FSB"? And is this FSB related to page 6 settings no.3 of "1016FSB/DDR2-686"? Just curious, thank you! :)
pookie69 - Friday, July 9, 2004 - link
Cool - i think i understand that now.Thanks for replying and explaining. Appreciated :)
Wesley Fink - Friday, July 9, 2004 - link
The ratio is 3:4 looking at base clocks (200 to 266). The bus is then quad-pumped to 800 and memory is DOUBLE Data Rate or 533. I do agree it is a bit confusing since the final 800 ratio is 3:2 of the final DDR2 ratio (533).The 975/865 standard was 1:1 since the base clocks are 200, even though the final speeds were 800FSB (quad) and 400 DDR. It was never called 2:1.
pookie69 - Friday, July 9, 2004 - link
Nice article - good job :)Only one point; where it reads;
"This is currently slightly below the memory timing of 250 required to run memory at DDR2 667, at the standard 3:4 Intel memory ratio for DDR2."
>>> shouldn't that be a 3:2 ratio?
Or am i confused :S
Nice article again - keep up the good work Mr. Fink ;)
TrogdorJW - Friday, July 9, 2004 - link
I think a better conclusion might have been: And the winner is... NO ONE! (Or everyone, depending on whether you see the glass as half full or half empty.) While there are definitely measurable differences in performance between the various memories, reality is that only Quake 3 and Enemy Territory are meaningful benchmarks. Seeing that Quake 3 is one of the most bandwidth hungy games of all time, it's rather telling that a 15.4% advantage in Sandra only equates to a 2.7% performance difference in Quake 3 (and even less in W:ET). I'm not criticizing your work, mind you - just pointing out that the best case scenario of Sandra Unbuffered RAM tests are not the way we actually use our systems.At some point, it would be nice to see a memory roundup that included all the benchmarks that are used in CPU and graphics comparisons. Obviously, that wouldn't be a prudent use of your time when we're still being limited by the motherboard. However, in another six months, I would like to see a memory comparison put together that broadened the field of view in regards to benchmarks.
Great article, though. It will certainly be interesting to see how far each memory type can actually overclock when the motherboard is no longer the limiting factor. For the present, though, it looks like we might as well just save our pennies and buy cheaper DDR2 modules. (Not that any of them are actually "cheap"....)
Pumpkinierre - Thursday, July 8, 2004 - link
I suppose with all these new goodies, Wesley, you are going to give up on the excellent straight DDR articles you used to do.For the tRAS, the usual formula for DDR is: tRCD+CAS latency + 2 cycles, see:
http://www.mushkin.com/mushkin/pop-up/latencies.ht...
So that seems to work for DDR2 at tRAS >10. I dont know why DDR2 still works at tRAS of 4 though. I also dont know why nForce chipsets have their tRAS so high (10-12) on ordinary DDR.
You've got an engineering sample (multiplier unlocked) Prescott that o'clocks well. So you ought to do some tests at same CPU speed but different FSBs like you have done on the a64s. I know you might think it is stupid given that retail cpus are multiplier locked but some of us want to see whether it is better to put more money in a higher grade cpu or get a cheaper one and o'clock it high using more expensive high speed low latency memory. You had'nt done this with the N'wood/i875 memory tests either, but I cant remember whether you've got a good N'wood engineering sample lying around. Anyway just a suggestion.
ariafrost - Thursday, July 8, 2004 - link
Now if only DDR2 latencies were lower and the pricetag was less than DDR1 :)