Memory Performance: 16GB DDR3-1333 to DDR3-2400 on Ivy Bridge IGP with G.Skill
by Ian Cutress on October 18, 2012 12:00 PM EST- Posted in
- Memory
- G.Skill
- Ivy Bridge
- DDR3
I remember buying my first memory kit ever. It was a 4GB kit of OCZ DDR2 for my brand new E6400 system, and at the time I paid ~$240, sometime back in 2005. Skip forward seven years and users can enjoy four times as much density for under 1/3 of the price, an upswing by a factor 12x in terms of density against price. However in terms of the memory landscape, performance is a key factor when deciding between kits that cost almost the same, and making sure if that extra $15 for the next memory kit up is worth the jump.
The pricing for each of the kits are as follows:
$75: Ares DDR3-1333 9-9-9 4x4 GB
$80: RipjawsX DDR3-1600 9-9-9 4x4 GB
$95: Sniper DDR3-1866 9-10-9 4x4 GB
$130: RipjawsZ DDR3-2133 9-11-10 4x4 GB
$145: TridentX DDR3-2400 10-12-12 4x4 GB
Ultimately the best way to look at these results is through the IGP comparison graph posted several pages back:
Our synthetic test shows that as memory kits get faster, sub-timings can start to suffer (as in the kits we have tested), and as a result despite the extra MHz we can hit the law of limiting returns. If we tested a 2400 9-9-9 kit, I’m sure the synthetic test would rise proportionately as the jump from 1333 9-9-9 to 1600 9-9-9 and 1866 9-10-9 did. But it is the other results showing the kit comparison that makes interesting reading.
Ultimately whether a kit will be beneficial or not is down to the scenario in which it is used. All the tests today rely on having one part of the system at full stretch for a certain amount of time – either the CPU or the GPU. In most circumstances a system is not taxed, such as checking email or browsing the web, and thus memory may not make much of a difference (and it is hard to quantify in any scientific way). However, for situations where something is taxed, we can compare results.
As we see with our IGP testing, some games get boosted significantly with memory (Batman:AA), whereas some level out and get sub-10% boosts despite almost double the cost for that memory (Portal 2). In a similar fashion, our x264 decoding tests show that a small gain can be had, or in WinRAR up to 20% better performance is possible.
Writing this review has taken a lot longer than expected. Initially it comes down to what benchmarks should be run – there are a lot of synthetic results out in the wild from many sources, and I wanted to focus on real-world scenarios to aid buying decisions. Hopefully I have found a good number of different scenarios where buying that higher rated memory kit actually makes a difference – IGP gaming is the key one often quoted, but other options such as Maya, WinRAR compression and USB 3.0 throughput can be important too.
In the end, we have to recommend what kits our users should be looking for. Taking the DDR3-1333 C9 kit as a base, it seems a no-brainer to go for the DDR3-1600 C9 kit for $5 more. The boost across the board for a negligible difference in price is worth it. The jump up to the G.Skill 1866 C9 kit also provides enough of a measurable boost, although the leap in price from 1600 C9 is another $15, which could be harder to swallow.
As we move into the 2133 C9 kit we tested today, we again across our test bed see a tangible jump in performance. This jump is not as much as moving from 1333 to 1600, but it is there and users wanting peak performance will be happy with this kit, though the size of the user pockets will also have to match.
When it comes to our 2400 C10 kit results, compared to the 2133 C9, it is highly dependant which kit comes out on top. Even if one kit beats the other, it is only by a small margin – not one that can be justified by a $15 jump in the price.
For the majority of users, the DDR3-1866 C9 kit from G.Skill is a great buy, as long as the user remembers to enable XMP(!). Budget conscious builds will find solace in the DDR3-1600 C9 kit, which is a no brainer over the 1333 C9 kit for the extra $5. If your pockets are a little deeper, then the G.Skill DDR3-2133 C9 kit will offer some extra performance, but not as much as jumping between the other kits will. The DDR3-2400 C10 kit is not in the right ballpark compared to the other kits and only serves well for forum signatures. To sum up:
$75: Ares DDR3-1333 9-9-9 4x4 GB
$80: RipjawsX DDR3-1600 9-9-9 4x4 GB – Recommended for Budget Conscious
$95: Sniper DDR3-1866 9-10-9 4x4 GB – Recommended
$130: RipjawsZ DDR3-2133 9-11-10 4x4 GB – Recommended for Deeper Pockets
$145: TridentX DDR3-2400 10-12-12 4x4 GB – Not Recommended
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just4U - Saturday, October 20, 2012 - link
Peaunut we are not talking 300-500 bucks here.. this is a 20-30 dollar premium which is nothing in comparison to what ram used to cost and how much more premium ram was as well.If your on a tight budget get 8Gigs of regular ram which is twice the amount of ram you likely need anyway.
Tech-Curious - Monday, November 5, 2012 - link
Thing is, these tests are for integrated graphics, unless I'm misreading something (AFAICT, the discrete card was only used for PhysX support; if I misread there then I apologize).Off the top of my head, there are basically three scenarios in which you're likely to want an IGP:
1) You're building an HTPC, in which case you prioritize (lack of) noise and (lack of) heat over graphics' power. If all you want to run are movies, then the IGP should be adequate regardless of the speed of your memory -- and if you want to play games, no amount of memory is going to turn an Intel IGP into an adequate performer on your average TV set these days. (Better to grab an AMD APU or just give up the ghost and grab a moderate-performance GPU.)
2) You're looking to run a laptop. But the memory reviewed in this article doesn't apply to laptops anyway.
3) You're on a tight budget.
So at best, we're talking about a fraction of a sliver of a tiny niche in the market, when we discuss the people who might be interested in wringing every last ounce of performance out of an IGP by installing high-priced desktop memory. Sure, the difference in absolute cost between the cheapest and the most expensive RAM here isn't going to make or break most people -- but people generally don't like to incur unnecessary costs either.
And people who are on a budget? They can save $80, just based on the numbers in the article, without making any significant performance sacrifice. That's real money, computer-component-wise.
tynopik - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
"I remember buying my first memory kit ever. It was a 4GB kit"makes you feel old
my first was 8MB
DanNeely - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
My first computer only had 16k.Mitch101 - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
VIC-203583 bytes free
jamyryals - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
wow :)just4U - Saturday, October 20, 2012 - link
The first computer i bough was a tandy 1000. I got them to put in 4 megs of ram.. at 50 bucks per meg.GotThumbs - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
Same here.I had purchased a used AT Intel 486DX 33Mhz powered system and upgraded it to 16mb around 1989. Overclocking it was done using jumpers on the motherboard. Heck, in HS I was a student assistant my senior year and recorded everyone's grades on a cassette tape drive using a Tandy (TS-80 I believe). It blows my mind thinking about how things have changed. There's more power/ram in a Raspberry PI than my first computer.
Best wishes for computing in the next ~30 years.
andrewaggb - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
Agreed, my first computer I owned personally was a 486 slc 33 (cyrix....) and I had a couple 1mb memory sticks, can't remember if those were called sims or something else. We had an apple 2+, trs 80, commodore 64, and ibm pc jr in the early-mid 80's but those were my dads :-), and some 286 that I can't remember the brand of.Just thinking about the e6400 as a first pc amuses me :-), that's still usable, and actually is when most of the computer fun started to die in my books. My current pc's are running phenom II 965, i5 2500k, i7 620m, i5 750, i7 720qm and I just have little motivation to upgrade anything ever.
Haswell is the first chip in a long time that I'm excited about. Everything else has been meh. And AMD... I had an amd 486-120,K6-200,K6-2 300,athlon xp 1800,2500, athlon 64 3200, athlon 64 x2 4800, 5600, phenom II 945,phenom x3, and my current 965 and a c-50 e netbook. man hard to believe all the computers I've had :-) Anyways, amd has nothing I want anymore, except cheap multicore cpus for running x264 all day.
IanCutress - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
E6400 wasn't the first PC... just the first processor I actually bought memory for. The rest were pre-built or hand-me-downs. :) I actually just took the same motherboard/chip out of my brother's computer (he has had it for a few years, with that memory) and bumped him up to Sandy Bridge. I'm still 27, and the E6400 system was new for me when I was around 21 or so. Since then I've got a Masters and a PhD - time flies when you're having fun!Ian