Value RAM Roundup: Computing On a Budget
by Wesley Fink on April 11, 2005 4:26 PM EST- Posted in
- Memory
The Memories
The first task in our look at Value RAM was to define Value RAM. With top memories selling for $250 to $400 (or even higher) for a 1GB kit, we decided that a price limit of $200 for a 1GB kit (2x512MB DIMMs) of DDR memory would be our cut-off. Admittedly, this excludes some good value Samsung TCCD kits from companies like PQI and Patriot, but these products are really just good buys and marketed by the companies as Performance memory.We requested Value RAM for our review from Corsair, Kingston, Mushkin, OCZ and Transcend as a representative cross-section of the memory industry. We asked these manufacturers to supply a 1GB kit (2x512MB) of a Value RAM product or products that sold on the web for less than $200. We asked them to supply whatever RAM they wished that met these criteria, which we would be comparing in performance to other Value RAM products in a memory roundup.
All the manufacturers supplied one or more samples for testing except Corsair. Corsair emailed us, stating that "Our policy is not to send Value Select parts for review for a variety of reasons. After a quick discussion here we decided to stick with that policy and sit this one out." When we asked for clarification, Corsair expressed concern that we would be testing performance and overclocking of their Value products when memory chips change frequently on these products. The concern is that the overclocking performance we would report in a roundup today might not be what a customer would get tomorrow because chips change frequently in value products. Corsair recommended that customers looking for overclocking and enthusiast level performance should purchase Corsair products that are geared to performance and overclocking, where results are consistent.
The Value RAM roundup resulted with seven memory pairs from four manufacturers.
| Manufacturer | Description (Memory Chips) |
Memory Speed | Rated Timings | Web Price (1GB) |
| Kingston | KVR400X64C25/512 (Kingston) |
400 DDR | 2.5-3-3 | $142 |
| Kingston | KVR400X64C3AK2/1G (Elpida) |
400 DDR | 3-3-3 | $100 ($91 on sale) |
| Mushkin | EM Series PC3200 (Unknown) |
400 DDR | 3-3-3 | $147 |
| OCZ | PC3200 Premier P/N OCZ4001024PDC-K (PSC) |
400 DDR | 2.5-3-3-7 | $121 |
| OCZ | PC3200 Value Series P/N OCZ4001024WV3DC-K (Winbond - Value VX) |
400 DDR | 2.5-3-3-7 | $115 |
| OCZ | PC3200 Gold P/N OCZ4001024ELDCGE-K (Winbond BH5) |
400 DDR | 2-2-2-5 | $195 |
| Transcend | JM366D643A-50 (JetRam) |
400 DDR | 2.5-3-3 | $100 |
The seven memories represent quite a range of choices in memory under $200 for a Gigabyte. First, we were pleasantly surprised that all of the memories except one now actually cost below $150 for a Gigabyte. That one memory, OCZ PC3200 Gold, will still interest many Value RAM buyers because it represents the revival of Winbond BH5 chips, which were discontinued from the market over 6 months ago. We are told that Winbond is manufacturing BH5 again from old dies, and we will be testing this Value RAM at the higher voltages possible on the DFI nForce4 motherboard.
The other big surprise is also from OCZ. We learned (when OCZ introduced their VX memory at DDR500 2-2-2 speed) that there would also be a Value Series version of the VX. What we did not expect was that the new "Value VX" would cost just $115 for a Gigabyte of memory. These are the same chips that were top-performers in a recent memory review. The Value Series uses unbinned chips, so performance is not guaranteed, but we were still anxious to see if this or the new Value BH5 might be the proverbial "silk purse from a sow's ear" for the cheap computer enthusiast. We all like to get something for nothing - or, at least, for very little money.
As you will see from the results, there were quite a few surprises in Value RAM performance. This includes a few very cheap but solid performers that will satisfy many users, and a couple of memories that are as mundane as we expect of Value RAM. For those of you looking for dynamite performance at cheap prices, we also found that silk purse amongst the Value RAM candidates.
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Wesley Fink - Tuesday, April 12, 2005 - link
#52-#55 - There are Part numbers for ALL the memories in the review in the chart on Page 2. OCZ responded in post #44 that the 3-4-4-8 and 2.4-3-3-8 were the same VX memory. The parts are rated at what they can do at standard voltage - not what they can do at 3.0V and above.#45 - Continuing your analogy. If a Ferrari (Value VX) were available for the same price as a Chevrolet Cobalt, then I think readers would expect me to include the Ferrari in my review of Value cars - despite the fact the Ferrari might need hard to find racing alcohol (3.0V to 3.5V) to run properly while the Cobalt only needed easy to find unleaded regular gasoline (2.6V).
adg1034 - Tuesday, April 12, 2005 - link
Isn't that what he did with the Value VX? Check out the article...Zebo - Tuesday, April 12, 2005 - link
How bout the real "value" modules which really are cheap and contain same chips as high end ram? Just not speed binnned but who gives a rats ass for that kind of value.Some I can think of right off top off head are:
Crucial's with micron G's = Ballistix for half price.
TwinMOS with Winbond VX = OCZ VX for less than half price.
Kingston VR with Hynix BT = All those high end sparkly packaged 4200 modules for half price.
And so on.
Meh not what I was expecting.
Hardtarget - Tuesday, April 12, 2005 - link
good article except for one thing! I wish you had compared generic Samsung OEM ram.I don't know about the US but in Canada right now OEM Samsung game is super cheap. you can get 1gig for 100 bucks canadian. It's incredibly popular.
Would of been a great starting point to the article and good to see how it compares to non oem versions.
Ranger123 - Tuesday, April 12, 2005 - link
I think you need to clear up the issue regarding Corsair not providing memory. Corsair's response indicates why they chose not to supply their Value Select parts, but it doesn't explain why no XMS modules were provided. At least a couple of the XMS kits meet your criteria and I assume that these are the parts they were referring to when they said that OCers should look at their parts that are "geared to performance and overclocking".I can see 4 possible reasons for Corsair's refusal to send an XMS kit:
1. Corsair misread the AT request and thought only the Value Select parts qualified.
2. Corsair doesn't want anything in their XMS line associated with the phrase "Value RAM".
3. As others have suggested, Corsair knew their modules wouldn't perform well and decided that no result was better than a bad result.
4. Corsair is using the same rotating chip trick on these XMS modules that they are on the Value Select, they're just not admitting it.
Given Corsair's reputation I would assume that it's one of the first two, but if Corsair is resorting to some questionable practices I think the AT community would want to know. Maybe you can contact whoever you deal with at Corsair and get an explanation.
Crassus - Tuesday, April 12, 2005 - link
When I saw the headline of the review I expected the review to be somewhat different, to be honest. The tests in itself are not bad at all, but if you still have the samples I ask you both in my name and the names off all the folks complaning about the voltages to perform at least some tests at Voltages around 2.8 - 2.9 Volts to allow us to see how these RAMs perform at other boards (e.g. nForce3+4) and how far they will go in MHz @1T.I, too, have to question the ethics of this review in the light of the recent debate. How do we know that the samples you tested are of the same kind as we can buy, if its up to the manufacturer to send you whatever they see fit? Especially when it comes to !value! parts I doubt it will be too much of a problem to recieve them through other channels who will not be as interested in the outcome of the review as the manufacturer (Retail chains or online shops?). You may even consider buying them yourself anonymously to remove any doubt and sell them off lateron. Shouldn't be too hard with a community like this one or an online auction site.
Cheers,
Crassus
Backslider - Tuesday, April 12, 2005 - link
I'd like to comment on my experince with Value and Special Edition type RAM.While recenly building a set of PCs, I was reading articles similar to this one. I was convinced that in order to get a good system with future potential of over clocking I would need to buy the more expensive (non-value) RAM.
I happly paid approx. 50% more for this "Extreme Memory", thinking it would be perfect for a stable system. However, after I built my pair of systems I ran into trouble.
One of the two systems failed to install Windows. And to make a long story short, I ended up with a bad pair of RAM. I RMA'ed them to and received yet another faulty set of RAM. Finaly, I sent them to the maufacturer for an RMA. This time I received a set that hardly squeek by at stock speed. Overclocking by even 1% means instant BSOD.
Since this happened, I've been buying Value RAM. (from a different manufacturer) And havent run into any problems yet.
I also find it interesting that the manufacturer of the faulty RAM that I received, declined to Anandtech's request for test samples. Also, there reasoning was a bit questionable considering that their out of their "XMS" line, I received 4 (pairs) of modules that all performed VERY differently. (1 great, 2 bad, 1 not worth the RMA)
Thats just my input, based on my experience and nothing more.
-Backslider
Den - Tuesday, April 12, 2005 - link
#54 (and 52).I agree, if you are certain you will never overclock you should just get cheap ram with ok timings at stock speed. Interesting that the timings on the picture that you mention (2.5-3-3-7) match what is in the article here.
I understand why the articles don't have links to buy it, but it really would help if they would at least include the manufacturer's part/model number, then we could be sure.
segagenesis - Tuesday, April 12, 2005 - link
#53 - Actually clicking on the image you can see the ram is marked differently than the newegg page (wtf!) as 2.5-3-3-7 in the picture but 2.5-4-4-8. Ummm...Unfortunately I must be somewhat critical when my eyes spin around an article that gives praise to memory for $115 yet doesnt mention *where*. Let alone just a single link to buy it at any price.
Now granted the Corsair value runs at 2.5-3-3-7 also and likely has little headroom for people who want more out of less, but I consider it a good deal for those like me who dont overclock memory. *takes a breath* With the OCZ being $148 off the same site vs. $87 Corsair, for stock performance its not exactly "value" to me unless you are an overclocker. More like "value if you take the risk". A damn shame Corsair would not submit samples.
Den - Tuesday, April 12, 2005 - link
re: #52http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?desc...
has timings a little closer but you are right, it sure would be nice if they put actual model numbers in the reviews instead of leaving us to guess.