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
The realm of DDR3-2400 MHz memory is reserved for two types of setup – strong Sandy Bridge and Sandy Bridge-E processors, or Ivy Bridge processors. The former can depend on the motherboard as well – within my motherboard testing I was finding that some motherboards enjoyed running at DDR3-2400 with an appropriate processor, whereas others needed a bump in voltages to get to work. For Ivy Bridge processors though, DDR3-2400 should be a walk in the park – based on overclocking results it seems that processors produced in Malaysia have good memory controllers, whereas ones made in Costa Rica have better processor speed/voltage characteristics (though your mileage may vary). So having a high and stable memory speed is ideally paired with an Ivy Bridge processor at this point.
As you can imagine, if DDR3-2133 was getting expensive, then DDR3-2400 is even much more so, even if the kit is rated C10 rather than C9. The additional cost comes mainly from binning – i.e. making sure that there are enough ICs to go into these memory kits. A 4x4 GB kit needs 32 ICs capable of running this speed, and to get those 32 may require north of 500 ICs to be tested (the rest get binned into other slower modules), though the exact numbers are obviously a well kept secret from G.Skill. If I recall, in the early days of Nehalem, the high end 2000 C8 modules were literally 1 in 100 that passed the tests, and hence the exorbitant price at the time. This DDR3-2400 C10 kit comes in at $145, not much of a leap from DDR3-2133 C9 at $130, but the benchmarks will paint a truer picture of how much this difference matters later in the review.
Visual Inspection
The DDR3-2400 C10 kit today provided by G.Skill covers its TridentX branding. TridentX is one notch above RipjawsZ, and spans kits from DDR3-2400 C9 to DDR3-2800 C11. The main features on the kit (aside from the speeds) are the heatsinks, to which G.Skill have added a detachable fin. Without the fin, the module is approximately 9mm above the module, and with the fin the total height is 22mm above the PCB. That is a lot of height for a memory module that in 99% of circumstances would not produce enough temperature to trouble any build.
In order to remove the fin there is a screw at each end of the module, and the fin slides off effortlessly. The fins fit very well, but upon attempting to reattach a fin I was unable to get it on as securely as it came out of the box, leaving a little wobble in the fin. There is no cause for alarm if you get a module with a wobbly fin – nothing is wrong, and it will not affect the heat dissipation as much as most users may think. Most modules output a few watts at best, so dissipation of several watts of energy without a fin is simple enough.
Putting such a large module in our TRUE Copper scenario was a recipe for disaster:
Even putting the module in the second slot faired no better:
All the testing for this review was done on a ASUS P8Z77-V Premium motherboard with the Intel stock cooler, so module movement is not much an issue in that case, but big air coolers still get a lot of usage (and is more often than not an investment over several updates), so there are things to consider when purchasing memory.
JEDEC + XMP Settings
| G.Skill | |||||
| Kit Speed | 1333 | 1600 | 1866 | 2133 | 2400 |
| Subtimings | 9-9-9-24 2T | 9-9-9-24 2T | 9-10-9-28 2T | 9-11-10-28 2T | 10-12-12-31 2T |
| Price | $75 | $80 | $95 | $130 | $145 |
| XMP | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Size | 4 x 4 GB | 4 x 4 GB | 4 x 4 GB | 4 x 4 GB | 4 x 4 GB |
|
|
|||||
| MHz | 1333 | 1600 | 1867 | 2134 | 2401 |
| Voltage | 1.500 | 1.500 | 1.500 | 1.650 | 1.650 |
| tCL | 9 | 9 | 9 | 9 | 10 |
| tRCD | 9 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 |
| tRP | 9 | 9 | 9 | 10 | 12 |
| tRAS | 24 | 24 | 28 | 28 | 31 |
| tRC | 33 | 33 | 37 | 38 | 43 |
| tWR | 10 | 12 | 14 | 16 | 16 |
| tRRD | 4 | 5 | 5 | 6 | 7/6 |
| tRFC | 107 | 128 | 150 | 171 | 313 |
| tWTR | 5 | 6 | 8/7 | 9/8 | 10/9 |
| tRTP | 5 | 6 | 8/7 | 9/8 | 10/9 |
| tFAW | 20 | 24 | 24 | 25 | 26 |
| tCWL | - | 7 | 7 | 7 | 7 |
| CR | - | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 |
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andrewaggb - Friday, October 19, 2012 - link
Fair enough :-)HisDivineOrder - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
You "remember" getting your first memory kit and it was for a E6400. You act like that's just this classic thing.I remember getting a memory kit for my Celeron 300a. I remember getting a memory kit for my AMD K6 with 3dNow!.
Wow, I'm old.
silverblue - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
I remember getting a 64MB PC100 DIMM in 2000... it was pretty much £1 a MB. Made a difference, so it was *gulp* worth it.StormyParis - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
Very interesting read. Thank you.rscoot - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
I remember paying upwards of $400 for a pair of matched 2x512MB Kingston HyperX modules with BH-5 chips. Those were the days! 300MHz at 2-2-2-5 1T in dual channel if you could put enough volts through them. Nowadays I don't think memory matters nearly as much as it did back then.superflex - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
Your first kit was an E6400?Let me know when you get hair down there.
My first computer was an Apple IIe in 1984, and my first build was an Opteron 170 with 400 MHz 2,2,2,5 DDR.
Magnus101 - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
Once again this only confirms that memory speed makes no real world difference.I mean, who in their right mind use the integrated GPU on an expensive i7-system to play metro-2033 with single digit framerate?
The only thing standing out is the Winrar compression, but, how many use winrar for compression?
Yes to decompress files it is very common but I only remember using it 2-3 times in my whole life to compress my own files.
So that isn't important to most users, except for the ones that actually use winrar to compress files.
And I don't get why the x264 encoding seemed like a big deal. The differences were very small.
It's beem the same story all the way back to the late 90;s were tests between sdr memory at 100 and 133 MHz or at different timings showed no differences in real life applications in contrast to synthetics.
But sure, if you are building a new system and choose between, let say 1333 or 1600, then a $5 difference is a no brainer.
Then again, it would make no noticeable difference anyway.
silverblue - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
Here's one - will it affect QuickSync in any way?twoodpecker - Monday, October 22, 2012 - link
I'd be interested in QuickSync results too. In my experience, not proven, it makes a big difference. I adjusted my memory speeds from 1600 to 2000 and noticed at some point that encoding is 25x instead of 15x. This might be due to different factors though, like software optimizations, because I didn't benchmark after adjusting mem speeds.Geofram - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
I don't believe he's implying that single digit frame rates on a game are going to real-life usable for anyone. I believe the point of the test was simply: "Lets take a system that is generally fast and put it in a situation where the IGP is being stressed. This will be the best-case scenario for faster RAM helping it. Lets see if it does".To me the idea was not showing everyone everyday situations where faster RAM will help them, instead it was to see where those situations might lay, by setting up a stressful situation and seeing the results. Most of the results were extremely small differences.
I agree it's not a noticeable difference in most cases. It doesn't make me feel like I should get rid of PC1333 RAM. I don't fault the logic for the tests used however. It was nice to see someone actually comparing the slight differences caused by RAM speed.