The Performance and Overclocking of DDR4 Memory Kits

That was actually slower than this DDR4 3000 owing to the fact that the timings on this at 1.35 volts are so tight, 15-15-15-35 is pretty good uh timings for DDR4 3000 so when you're looking at memory it's not just the clock speed, DDR4 3000 DDR4 3200, DDR4, you know, 3466, it's also the timing numbers because these represent delays and refresh cycles that have to happen with the RAM in order to use it effectively without actually uh losing any information.

Now in terms of overclocking, even beyond the 15-15-35 I did have to push the voltage up a little bit which on Skylake is asking for bad news. You know Skylake supports DDR3 but technically really uh Skylake only supports DDR3 low voltage. The reason for that is that over time Intel warns that the voltage controller and the voltage interface that's actually on board on the sky processor really can't handle more than 1.35 volts over the long term, and so DDR3 not L um is going to be potentially a higher voltage than 1.35 volts, and that's why the Skylake platform even though it's Backward Compatible with DDR3 is really DDR3 low voltage.

This is not really a problem this is where you see Skylake in you know portable devices and Skylake in maybe small form factor your desktops where the RAM is maybe soldered in or maybe uses notebook RAM, and so in this particular case we're working with DDR4 of course but it's 1.35 volts and so you could push it to 1.4 volts and actually get timings that are more on the order of 15-15-15, you know, 28 and have a reasonably stable system. But I was not brave enough to really push the memory voltage much past 1.4 volts.

Most of the time except for the onboard GPU, the onboard GPU is what benefits the most from overclocking RAM, and having higher speeded Ram U there are other benchmarks that benefit but most day-to-day things really don't benefit very much from going from 2133 to you know 3200 and Beyond if you're a web developer or developer in general if you're doing stuff with databases where you've got massive key value pairs stored in memory things like Redus uh the faster memory makes a huge difference, like 50% faster when you have a 50% memory clock increase. So if you're doing that that's pretty good of course.

This is on error correcting and other stuff that you would normally have in a server, so you know it it'd probably be okay for a Dev server, it's like oh we're going to run you know ricit and super fast speed and then you have the problem of when you roll something out from development to production it's slower on production but that's neither here nor there. I'm happy to report that the uh the heat spreaders on this were effective, uh I really didn't have any problems doing any burn in testing basically overclocked it ran it for 48 hours did we get any memory errors nope.

Uh in the motherboards that we tested it in throw it in XMP profile good to go. I would have liked to have seen more than one XMP profile, I don't know what it is with memory this generation there's only one XMP profile on pretty much all the memory that we've tested and you know I remember in DDR3 with XMP you had a couple of choices, you know higher voltage and faster clocks or lower voltage and you know maybe a slower clock speed. But with this and most of the memory that we've tested for Skylake you get pretty much one XMP profile now.

If you use CPU Z you can actually see some more J deck profiles and that will give you clues about manually setting some memory timings but that's probably a topic for another day. What's the bottom line? Well the performance is pretty good, and depending on where you find these, and sort of what price you find them at it's a good deal, it's a good value in terms of like the build quality and the assembly and the heat spreader, and that sort of thing checks out. I don't see anything to complain about so I think this pretty good.

So if you got some of these I'd love to hear from you in the forms, I don't really have a lot of experience with um mushkin memory the last couple of years, and it looks like mushkin is is experiencing some growth, so this has been a quick look at the mushkin black line ridgeback memory kit 2 by 8 gigs. If you've got one of these you're thinking about getting one of these handang on over to the forums at tex.com I'm window I'll see you there

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: entoday we're going to take a look at mushkin black line this is uh bdr 4 memory uh it is 15 15 1535 at 1.35 volts timing this is 2 8 gig sticks this stuff is pretty cool um 155 1535 is some of the tightest timings that we've seen on ddr4 that basically works out to ddr4 3000 um we've tested other memory that is ddr4 3000 and ddr4 3200 that had uh much larger timings um and actually we tested some ddr4 3200 that was actually slower than this ddr4 3000 owing to the fact that the timings on this at 1.35 volts are so tight 15 15 15 35 is pretty good uh timings for ddr4 3000 so when you're looking at memory it's not just the clock speed ddr4 3000 ddr4 3200 ddr4 you know 3466 it's also the timing numbers because these represent delays um and refresh cycles that have to happen with the ram in order to use it effectively without actually uh losing any information now in terms of overclocking it Beyond even the 155 1535 I did have to push the voltage up a little bit which on Skylake is asking for bad news you know Skylake supports DDR3 but technically really uh Skylake only supports DDR3 low voltage the reason for that is that over time Intel warns that the voltage controller and the voltage interface that's actually on board on the sky processor really can't handle more than 1.35 volts over the long term and so DDR3 not L um is going to be potentially a higher voltage than 1.35 volts and that's why the Skylake platform even though it's Backward Compatible with DDR3 is really DDR3 low voltage and so this is not really a problem this is where you see Skylake in you know portable devices and Skylake in maybe small form factor your desktops where the ram is maybe soldered in or maybe uses notebook RAM and so in this particular case we're working with ddr4 of course but it's 1.35 volts and so you could push it to 1.4 volts and actually get timings that are more on the order of 15 15 15 you know 28 and have a reasonably stable system but I was not brave enough to really push the memory voltage much past 1.4 volts and most of the time except for the onboard GPU the onboard GPU is what benefits the most from overclocking RAM and having higher speeded Ram U there are other benchmarks that benefit but most day-to-day things really don't benefit very much from going from 2133 to you know 33200 and Beyond if you're a web developer or developer in general if you're doing stuff with a databases where you've got massive key value pairs stored in memory things like redus uh the faster memory makes a huge difference like 50% faster when you have a 50% memory clock increase so if you're doing that that's pretty good of course this is on error correcting and other stuff that you would normally have in a server so you know it it'd probably be okay for a Dev server it's like oh we're going to run you know ricit and super fast speed and then you have the problem of when you roll something out from development to production it's slower on production but that's neither here nor there I'm happy to report that the uh the heat spreaders on this were effective uh I really didn't have any problems doing any burn in testing basically overclocked it ran it for 48 hours did we get any memory errors nope uh in the motherboards that we tested it in throw it in XMP profile good to go I would have liked to have seen more than one XMP profile I don't know what it is with memory this generation there's only one XMP profile on pretty much all the memory that we've tested and you know I remember in DDR3 with XMP you had a couple of choices you know higher voltage and faster clocks or lower voltage and you know maybe a slower clock speed but with this and most of the memory that we've tested for Skylake you get pretty much one XMP profile now if you use CPU Z you can actually see some more J deck profiles and that will give you clues about manually setting some memory timings but that's probably a topic for another day what's the bottom line well the performance is pretty good and depending on where you find these and and sort of what price you find these at it's a good deal it's a good value in terms of like the build quality and the assembly and the heat spreader and that sort of thing checks out I don't see anything to complain about so I think this pretty good so if you got some of these I'd love to hear from you in the forms I don't really have a lot of experience with um mushkin memory the last couple of years and it looks like mushkin is is experiencing some growth so this has been a quick look at the mushkin black line ridgeback memory kit 2 by 8 gigs if you've got one of these you're thinking about getting one of these handang on over to the forums at tex.com I'm window I'll see you theretoday we're going to take a look at mushkin black line this is uh bdr 4 memory uh it is 15 15 1535 at 1.35 volts timing this is 2 8 gig sticks this stuff is pretty cool um 155 1535 is some of the tightest timings that we've seen on ddr4 that basically works out to ddr4 3000 um we've tested other memory that is ddr4 3000 and ddr4 3200 that had uh much larger timings um and actually we tested some ddr4 3200 that was actually slower than this ddr4 3000 owing to the fact that the timings on this at 1.35 volts are so tight 15 15 15 35 is pretty good uh timings for ddr4 3000 so when you're looking at memory it's not just the clock speed ddr4 3000 ddr4 3200 ddr4 you know 3466 it's also the timing numbers because these represent delays um and refresh cycles that have to happen with the ram in order to use it effectively without actually uh losing any information now in terms of overclocking it Beyond even the 155 1535 I did have to push the voltage up a little bit which on Skylake is asking for bad news you know Skylake supports DDR3 but technically really uh Skylake only supports DDR3 low voltage the reason for that is that over time Intel warns that the voltage controller and the voltage interface that's actually on board on the sky processor really can't handle more than 1.35 volts over the long term and so DDR3 not L um is going to be potentially a higher voltage than 1.35 volts and that's why the Skylake platform even though it's Backward Compatible with DDR3 is really DDR3 low voltage and so this is not really a problem this is where you see Skylake in you know portable devices and Skylake in maybe small form factor your desktops where the ram is maybe soldered in or maybe uses notebook RAM and so in this particular case we're working with ddr4 of course but it's 1.35 volts and so you could push it to 1.4 volts and actually get timings that are more on the order of 15 15 15 you know 28 and have a reasonably stable system but I was not brave enough to really push the memory voltage much past 1.4 volts and most of the time except for the onboard GPU the onboard GPU is what benefits the most from overclocking RAM and having higher speeded Ram U there are other benchmarks that benefit but most day-to-day things really don't benefit very much from going from 2133 to you know 33200 and Beyond if you're a web developer or developer in general if you're doing stuff with a databases where you've got massive key value pairs stored in memory things like redus uh the faster memory makes a huge difference like 50% faster when you have a 50% memory clock increase so if you're doing that that's pretty good of course this is on error correcting and other stuff that you would normally have in a server so you know it it'd probably be okay for a Dev server it's like oh we're going to run you know ricit and super fast speed and then you have the problem of when you roll something out from development to production it's slower on production but that's neither here nor there I'm happy to report that the uh the heat spreaders on this were effective uh I really didn't have any problems doing any burn in testing basically overclocked it ran it for 48 hours did we get any memory errors nope uh in the motherboards that we tested it in throw it in XMP profile good to go I would have liked to have seen more than one XMP profile I don't know what it is with memory this generation there's only one XMP profile on pretty much all the memory that we've tested and you know I remember in DDR3 with XMP you had a couple of choices you know higher voltage and faster clocks or lower voltage and you know maybe a slower clock speed but with this and most of the memory that we've tested for Skylake you get pretty much one XMP profile now if you use CPU Z you can actually see some more J deck profiles and that will give you clues about manually setting some memory timings but that's probably a topic for another day what's the bottom line well the performance is pretty good and depending on where you find these and and sort of what price you find these at it's a good deal it's a good value in terms of like the build quality and the assembly and the heat spreader and that sort of thing checks out I don't see anything to complain about so I think this pretty good so if you got some of these I'd love to hear from you in the forms I don't really have a lot of experience with um mushkin memory the last couple of years and it looks like mushkin is is experiencing some growth so this has been a quick look at the mushkin black line ridgeback memory kit 2 by 8 gigs if you've got one of these you're thinking about getting one of these handang on over to the forums at tex.com I'm window I'll see you there\n"