Searching for the Memory Holy Grail - Part 2
by Wesley Fink on August 26, 2003 11:11 PM EST- Posted in
- Memory
Performance Test Configuration
| Performance Test Configuration | |
| Processor(s): | Intel Pentium 4 2.4GHz (800MHz FSB) |
| RAM: | 2 x 512 MB Adata PC4000 (DS) 2 x 512 MB Corsair PC4000 (DS) 2 x 512 MB Geil PC4000 (DS) 4 x 256 MB Kingston PC4000 (SS) 2 x 512 MB OCZ PC4000 (DS) 4 x 256 MB OCZ PC3700 GOLD (DS) |
| Hard Drives | Two Western Digital Raptor Serial ATA 36.7GB 10,000RPM drives in an Intel ICH5R RAID 0 configuration |
| PCI/AGP Speed | Fixed at 33/66 |
| Bus Master Drivers: | 875P Intel INF Update v5.00.1012, SATA RAID drivers installed, but IAA not installed |
| Video Card(s): | ATI 9800 PRO 128 MB, 128 MB aperture, 1024x768x32 |
| Video Drivers: | ATI Catalyst 3.6 |
| Operating System(s): | Windows XP Professional SP1 |
| Motherboards: | ASUS P4C800-E (875) with 1.010 Release BIOS |
We asked major memory manufacturers to supply DDR500 or the fastest memory that they had available for comparison in our High-Speed memory roundup. Not all manufacturers had DDR500 memory available, and some chose not to supply memory for our testing. All DDR500 memory was supplied by the Manufacturers to AnandTech for testing except Adata PC4000. Instead, Adata supplied DDR450 memory for our roundup. Although it performed very well in our testing, it did not reach our minimum requirement of DDR500 levels of performance, and thus, we did not believe it was fair to include Adata 450 in a roundup of DDR500. The Adata DDR500, however, was located and the retail product was purchased for the review.
Since OCZ 3700 GOLD was the first memory that we tested at AnandTech to have reached DDR500 performance levels, we also included it in our testing. Because the 3700 GOLD allows faster memory timings at some of our tested speeds, it also gave us an opportunity to see the impact of memory timings on test results.
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dshodson - Friday, September 5, 2003 - link
So what is the best memory to put in my new dell server coming in a week which has the 875 chip. I heard u cant really overclock this system although i havent received mine yet.Anonymous User - Tuesday, September 2, 2003 - link
Sorry about the typos ( its 11:36 PM here )Thanks
OCZGUY
Anonymous User - Tuesday, September 2, 2003 - link
Uberclocker ,If your having a problem with a OCZ part , email me directly , Most problems are related it simple setup issues , and your problem is verry likely fixed in a few simple steps , or with a bios update
My email is oczguy@ocztechnology.com
I will not like answer your email until tomorow ( tuesday ) as today is a holiday and I am not in the office today
Thanks
OCZGUY
Anonymous User - Monday, September 1, 2003 - link
Hello, I have followd your recommendation and bought an OCZ 4000 in Germany, this weekend. Unfortunately it has not performed to its specification. Can you tell me if there is a special part number I should look for to get their special 'reviewers golden sample' ?UberClocker
Anonymous User - Saturday, August 30, 2003 - link
I think if you have a cpu that will do 250 FSB and you purchase memory based on this article and you get within 98% of the results posted in this article, you owe Wesley $10.00. If 20% of the people with favorable results donated, there would be no more need to advertise. Now for the people who did not purchase ram based on this article and are bitching about it being bias, what are you bitching for?. This article has not cost you a cent.Thanks Wesley, you saved me a $100 on ram. I almost got caught up in all the hype about 4000 and 4200.
Fossil
Anonymous User - Saturday, August 30, 2003 - link
This article goes part way to answering the question of what memory configuration is fastest but I was disappointed that there was no variation in ratio.I would like to see a review that tests agressive timings against high frequency to see what produces the best results.
Also a test of all P4C chips running @ 3.6Ghz to see whether there's any benefit in buying the fastest chip.
With most motherboards easily hitting 1Ghz are we likely to be seeing a P4D which supports a 1066Mhz FSB?
Anonymous User - Friday, August 29, 2003 - link
I think the way to do these reviews is to tell the manufacturer you'd like to include them in a review, purchase the memory from a store you trust, and then get re-imbursed by the manufacturer. That way, there'd be no selected modules and you would know what you were going to put into the review (4 ss vs 2 ds).So, when do we get that part 2 of the 865/875 mobo roundup ?
retrospooty - Friday, August 29, 2003 - link
Wesley,I have run these tests myself on an IC7G at 200 , 230 250 and 280 FSB and found that 5:4 2-2-2 always beats 1:1 at 2.5-4-4, even 2.5 4-3 ... However SOME motherboards arent as efficient at 5:4 with some types of ram as others... If you try the same test on several different mobo's I think you will find that 5:4 2-2-2 is quite a bit faster in non-synthetic mem test benchmarks.
Oldfart # 64, you are right about the reviewers and using the synthetic tests to boost sales. good point.
Anonymous User - Friday, August 29, 2003 - link
If your not going to overclock, get low latency pc 3200 or 3500, the PC4000 wont help you at alleven IF you ARE going to overclock, the PC4000 will not likely get you better performance.
Anonymous User - Friday, August 29, 2003 - link
#67 I'm not an expert by any means but here is how I understand this discussion:If you are planning to use one of the faster processors such as the 3.0C you won't be able to achieve a big overclock because the multiplier for that processor is 15. If you want to use a higher speed processor such as the 2.8C or the 3.0c, you really dont need to spend the money on faster memory such as the PC4000 because you probably won't be able to overclock to a point that you will be able to reach a front side bus speed of 250mhz which is the lowest rated speed (x2=ddr500) of the memory module. So as the article has explained,you would be better off with
slower ram that has faster timings. However, if you have a slower processor such as the 2.4C or the 2.6C, you should be able to achieve a higher overclock because these processors have lower multipliers. In this case you would need faster ram such as the PC4000, because with these processors many have been able to set their front side bus up to and beyond 250mhz. In most scenarios with fast processors/slower ram vs slower processors/faster ram, IMHO, the performance difference may be fairly equal. What is really happening is a cost/benefit consideration. As always be careful!!! Overclocking can damage your system...you do it at your own risk!