Mushkin & Adata: 2 for the Fast-Timings Lane
by Wesley Fink on September 1, 2003 11:18 PM EST- Posted in
- Memory
Adata DDR450
Adata DDR450 is a very reasonably-priced memory, but somewhat difficult to find in the US market. It is readily available and widely used in many Asian markets. The Adata 450 we tested came as 2 separate Single-Bank dimms and was not supplied as a Dual-Channel kit. The dimms are packaged without heatspreaders and are assembled from blanks that are carrying an Adata ID.
Click image to view a larger picture.
The Adata is conservatively programmed in SPD at 2.5-4-4-8 timings, but the memory performs at much better timings, particularly at lower speeds. The Adata does not operate at anything less than a Ras-to-Cas setting of 3 at any speed we tested. This is not an issue with just Adata. We are finding this to be typical of most high-speed modules these days, including those advertised as low latency. Even our Corsair 3200LL rev.1.2 now has an SPD program of 2-2-3-6, with Ras-to-Cas at 3. It appears one trade off with recent memory chips is poorer Ras-to-Cas performance.
| Adata DDR450 — 2 x 256MB SS Dimms Intel 875P Performance |
||||||
| Memory Speed, Voltage, Timings | Quake3 fps |
UT2003 Flyby fps |
UT2003 Botmatch fps |
Sandra UNBuffered | Sandra Standard Buffered |
Super PI 2M places (time in sec) |
| 400@2.55V 2-2-3-7 |
311.00 | 192.6 | 68.00 | INT 2590 FLT 2667 |
INT 4776 FLT 4744 |
132s |
| 450@2.65V 2.5-3-4-7 |
334.57 | 205.94 | 74.10 | INT 2587 FLT 2611 |
INT 5209 FLT 5203 |
121s |
| 488@2.85V 2.5-4-4-8 |
356.90 | 216.42 | 79.55 | INT 2679 FLT 2685 |
INT 5630 FLT 5584 |
113s |
Since Adata is only available as SS modules and Adata only supplied 2 Single-Bank modules, performance cannot be fairly compared to 2 Double-Bank modules on the Intel 875 platform. In the larger DDR400 comparison that follows, Adata DDR450 can be compared to Kingston PC4000 2 x 256 SS, and then to 4 x 256 SS to get a rough idea of the performance improvement available with 4 SS dimms or 2 DS dimms. For best performance on an Intel 875/865 platform, we strongly suggest that you use FOUR Adata DDR450 modules.
| Adata DDR450 — 2 x 256MB SS Dimms AMD nForce2 Ultra 400 Performance |
||||||
| Memory Speed, Voltage, Timings | Quake3 fps |
UT2003 Flyby fps |
UT2003 Botmatch fps |
Sandra UNBuffered | Sandra Standard Buffered |
Super PI 2M places (time in sec) |
| 333@2.55V 2-2-3-4 |
289.8 | 199.82 | 73.27 | INT 1202 FLT 1294 |
INT 2566 FLT 2415 |
124s |
| 400@2.55V 2-2-3-4 |
344.6 | 233.61 | 87.53 | INT 1402 FLT 1503 |
INT 3060 FLT 2880 |
104s |
| 450@2.7V 2.5-3-4-6 |
376.43 | 251.44 | 96.26 | INT 1529 FLT 1617 |
INT 3411 FLT 3180 |
94s |
Performance on the Athlon test platform was generally outstanding, especially considering the price of Adata PC450 memory. We were a little surprised that we could reach a stable DDR450 on our nForce2 Ultra 400 testbed, and the increased speed did provide improved performance across the board.
These test setups were designed to test memory performance and should not be used as a direct comparison of Athlon Barton vs. Pentium4 performance. Because of the differences in architecture, our fastest P4 speed in this test is 2.73Ghz (244x12) and our fastest Barton in this test is 2475Ghz or about 3700+ on a rating scale. If you wish to compare Barton vs. P4, please compare these best Barton scores to the best P4 scores running at about 3.6Ghz.
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Wesley Fink - Tuesday, September 2, 2003 - link
MUSHKIN PC3500 LEVEL II AT FSB1000, 5:4 (DDR400, 2-2-2-5)We ran 1000FSB (500) at 5:4 with Mushkin PC3500 Level II at CAS 2-2-2-5. The testbed and ALL hardware and settings were the same as this review except for FSB/Ratio. Results are:
Sandra UNBuffered - 2964/2959 or avg. 2962
Sandra Buffered (Standard) ? 5470/5468 or avg. 5469
Quake 3 ? 393.7fps
UT2003 ? Flyby: 241.84
Botmatch: 87.66
SuperPI (2M places) ? 105s
Write these numbers down and compare them to DDR400 on page 8&9 and DDR500 in Part 2 Page 14 (500FSB/DDR500) charts. You will see that 5:4 2-2-2-5 is very close to the performance of the DDR500.
Anonymous User - Tuesday, September 2, 2003 - link
Oops... I have to take my last comment back. :(I have read through the whole article, and I dont see 250 FSB 1:1 3-4-4-8 vs 5:4 2-2-2-5 (200fsb vs. 250fsb ram speed) If they arent both tested together at the same CPU speed and FSB, only with the mem speed and timings change, its not perfect... But still a good review anyhow. :D
Retrospooty
Anonymous User - Tuesday, September 2, 2003 - link
Awesome review Wes,You took user feedback from the last review and tested your ram in a way NO OTHER REVIEWER HAS DONE SO FAR !!!! The right way.
Well done my friend, well done.
Retrospooty
Anonymous User - Tuesday, September 2, 2003 - link
Black is cool!the mushkin PC3500 Level II is the perfect combination with a IC7 Max3.
Anonymous User - Tuesday, September 2, 2003 - link
Given your propensity (and abuse by others) for OCZ, why did'nt you include OCZ platinum 3500 which is their ultra low latency RAM in this test. I have 2x256Mb OCZ platinum PC3200 (PC3500 wasnt and still isn't available in Australia when I built my system) in an ABIT IC7-G with 2.6C CPU. I get 2-2-2-5 to 190Mhz, 2-2-3-5 to 218 MHz and up to 230MHz on looser settings. I am moderately satisfied with this but I was offered CORSAIR XMS 3200 at time of purchase and, given your comments about Rev 1.1, I perhaps regret the path I took!wicktron - Tuesday, September 2, 2003 - link
I think you need to change the titles of the graphs on this page: http://www.anandtech.com/memory/showdoc.html?i=185...to DDR400 rather than DDR500.
wicktron - Tuesday, September 2, 2003 - link
Great review Wes.