Corsair Dominator TWIN3X2048-1800C7DFG
2. Testing the DDR3
For out tests used the following setup:
- CPU: Intel E6600 Retail
- CPU Cooler: Intel Stock
- Motherboard: Asus P5K3 Deluxe Wi-Fi Edition BIOS 0801 (beta)
- PSU: OCZ GameXStream GXS600 SLI-Ready
- VGA: MSI 7600GT Silent (stock memory/core timings)
- HDD: WD 800JB
- OS: Windows XP SP2 with all the latest updates installed
While for benchmarking we used:
- Sisoft Sandra 2007 SP1
- PC Mark 05 v1.1.0
- Everest Ultimate Edition 2007
- RightMark Memory Analyzer v3.70
- ScienceMark 2
- SuperPI XS Mod v1.50
- Memset v3.30
We overclocked Intel E6600 up to 3.60GHz in order to eliminate the CPU factor, as much as possible. By keeping the voltage at 2.00V we managed to get DDR3-1600 CL6 and DDR3-1800 at the promised CL7:
Memory Frequency/Timings |
Real Frequency |
Voltage |
Memory Ratio (FSB:RAM) |
CPU x |
FSB |
CPU Speed |
DDR3 1333 CL6-6-6-16 |
666,50 |
1,80 |
3:5 |
9 |
400 |
3600 |
DDR3 1600 CL6-6-6-16 |
800,00 |
2,00 |
1:2 |
9 |
400 |
3600 |
DDR3 1800 CL7-7-7-17 |
900,00 |
2,00 |
1:2 |
8 |
450 |
3600 |
DDR3 1869 CL8-8-8-24 |
934,10 |
2,25 |
1:2 |
7 |
467 |
3269 |
Keeping the FSB at 400MHz and the CPU multiplier at 9x we could directly compare DDR3-1333 and DDR3-1600. Then we dropped the CPU multiplier at 8x and we rised the FSB up to 450MHz in order for our CPU to operate again at 3.6GHz. Finally for finding the maximum memory speed, we dropped the CPU multiplier at 7x and we increased the FSB. Below are the highest memory speeds that we've achieved with 2.25V. We hit roof at 1869MHz, which should be considered as a medium performance since we have seen much higher overclocking performance with of course different processors and motherboards setups. In any case, the Corsair Dominator TWIN3X2048-1800C7DF G should be considered as a top rated product:
In all cases, the memory modules had to pass all memory synthetic tests without any problem. Note that the results vary from module to module and at this very high overclocking speeds, you need a very good cooling solution for the northbridge and of course the CPU.