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
- DDR3
- Ivy Bridge
- G.Skill
At the lowest end of our testing, we have a 16GB DDR3-1333 9-9-9 kit on hand. When DDR3 was first released, the main speed available was DDR3-800, but enough time has passed that this has phased out and now 1333 MHz is the new ‘minimum’. With the prices of memory as they are, this kit from G.Skill currently retails for $75, meaning that a massive amount of memory is available for all at a reasonable level. To put this into contrast, I remember spending ~$240 on a 2x2 GB Kit of DDR2-800 5-5-5 about 5-6 years ago – we can now get four times the capacity for less than a third of the price.
DDR3-1333 sits at the bottom end, but within months we can imagine DDR3-1600 taking that spot – as we will see with the next kit, for $5 more we get a faster product.
Visual Inspection
Our first kit features G.Skill’s Ares branding – the Ares kits that G.Skill sell are essentially meant to be the lower profile but colored heatsinks. These heatsinks in all honesty may not be entirely necessary for cooling, but they are firmly bonded to the memory modules and removing them would be a large task and more than likely damage the module. I have seen horror stories of chips being removed along with the heatsink, making the memory unusable. As a result we cannot directly observe which ICs are being used in our kits for this review. A quick word in the ear of G.Skill and they will not tell us the information, under the guise that it is classified and if the competition wants to know what G.Skill are using, they will have to buy a kit and break it themselves. Given how small the margins are in memory sales (as well as potential market stagnation after the credit crisis), I’m not surprised with the level of secrecy.
Anyway, back to the kit:
The standard packaging at G.Skill is a rather efficient plastic container holding each of the modules. The packaging is easy enough to open, though I also found it fairly brittle, meaning small shards could break off and be easily lodged in feet. Inside the box itself is a piece of card to advertise the kit and protect the modules from each other. We also get a small G.Skill sticker for the computer case.
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 |
107 Comments
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silverblue - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
It's okay, he said the same thing on Xbit Labs. ReplyVoraciousGorak - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
"For typical desktop use with RAM frequencies of 1333 MHz. and higher there is no tangible gains in SYSTEM performance to justify paying a premium for higher RAM frequency, increased capacity above 4 GB. or lower latencies - with APUs being the minor exception."No tangible gains above four gi-... what industries have you worked in? Because my old AdWords PPC company's software benefited from over 4GB, and that's the lightest workload I've had on a computer in a while. For home use, I just bumped my system to 16GB because I kept capping my 8GB, and I do zero video/photo work. If you just do word processing, I'll trade you a nice netbook with a VGA out for whatever you're using now.
DDR3-1333 to 1600 is almost the same price on Newegg, and 1866 isn't much more. Think about it in percentage cost of your computer. Using current Newegg prices for 2x4GB CL9 DDR3, a $1000 computer with 8GB DDR3-1333 will cost $1002 with DDR3-1600, $1011 with DDR3-1866, and $1025 with DDR3-2133. Not exactly a crushing difference. Reply
Olaf van der Spek - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
Why isn't XMP enabled by default? The BIOS should know what the CPU supports, shouldn't it? ReplyGigaplex - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
What this article glosses over is that G.Skill memory often recommends manually increasing the voltages when enabling XMP profiles. I have the F3-1866C10D-16GAB kit and G.Skill recommends pushing the memory controller voltage out of spec for Ivy Bridge in order to enable XMP. As a result I just run them at 1333 (they don't have 1600 timings in the SPD table and I can't be bothered experimenting to find a stable setting). ReplyIan Cutress - Friday, October 19, 2012 - link
I did not have to adjust the voltage once on any of these kits. If anything, what you are experiencing is more related to the motherboard manufacturer. Some manufacturers have preferred memory vendors, of which G.Skill may not be one. In that case you either have to use work arounds to make kits work, or wait for a motherboard BIOS update. If you have read any of my X79 or Z77 reviews, you will see that some boards do not like my 2400 C9 kit that I use for testing at XMP without a little voltage boost. But on the ASUS P8Z77-V Premium, all these kits worked fine at XMP, without issue.Ian Reply
frozentundra123456 - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
While interesting from a theoretical standpoint. I would have been more interested in a comparison in laptops using HD4000 vs A10 to see if one is more dependent on fast memory than others. To be blunt, I dont really care much about the IGP on a 3770K. It would have been a more interesting comparison in laptops where the igp might actually be used for gaming. I guess maybe it would have been more difficult to do with changing memory around so much in a laptop though.The other thing is I would have liked to see the difference in games at playable frame rates. Does it really matter if you get 5.5 or 5.9 fps? It is a slideshow anyway. My interest is if using higher speed memory could have moved a game from unplayable to playable at a particular setting or allowed moving up to higher settings in a game that was playable. Reply
mmonnin03 - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
RAM by definition is Random Access which means no matter where the data is on the module the access time is the same. It doesn't matter if two bytes are on the same row or on a different bank or on a different chip on the module, the access time is the same. There is no sequential or random difference with RAM. The only difference between the different rated sticks are short/long reads, not random or sequential and any reference to random/sequential reads should be removed. ReplyOlaf van der Spek - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
You're joking right? :p Replymmonnin03 - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
Well if the next commenter below says their memory knowledge went up by 10x they probably believe RAM reads are different depending on whether they are random or sequential. Replynafhan - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
"Random access" means that data can be accessed randomly as opposed to just sequentially. That's it. The term is a relic of an era where sequential storage was the norm.Hard drives and CD's are both random access devices, and they are both much faster on sequential reads. An example of sequential storage would be a tape backup drive. Reply