Eric Garay

Have you ever second guessed the RAM you’ve chosen or have wondered if you should’ve bought the faster, more expensive stuff? If so, you’re not alone. We’ve all done it. But, with a little research, you can save yourself some money and make the right choice. Let me show you what I’m talking about.

I recently received some Corsair Dominator 1600MHz DDR3 Dual Channel memory. This kit operates at 1600MHz at stock 8-8-8-24 memory timings requiring only 1.65 Volts. It’s some of the newest memory that’s compatible with motherboards using the new Intel P55 Chipset. You can find the memory on Newegg for roughly $129, or so.

Corsair offers a faster sibling dubbed the Dominator GT 1600MHz which operates at 7-7-7-21 memory timings also requiring 1.65 Volts. The difference here is the memory timings. The lower timings mean extra performance. But, this memory also costs about $164.99 due to the better ICs used to build the modules.

Since, I have a good quality GIGABYTE GA-P55-UD5 motherboard on hand, I was able to get the Dominator CAS8 kit to run CAS7 without any issues. All I had to do was enter the BIOS (by pressing the DEL key during initial boot) and find the memory options. Upon finding the timings for Memory Bank 1 and 2, I manually changed the first three timings from 8 to 7 and the TRAS from 24 to 21.

Some less sturdy motherboards might require extra Memory Voltage, but the P55-UD5 didn’t need it. The Memory Voltage was left to Auto in the BIOS which has run perfect now for over a week. It even passed MemTest which is pretty useful for detecting any memory errors that are associated with weak memory or bad timings.

If you’re planning on a computer build right now, or are going to order one, make sure you get a good quality motherboard. Chances are that the performance memory you’re buying will offer very similar results. And, all you had to do was change a few settings without shelling out extra money to get the same performance as the elite grade memory.

I’ve been stretched pretty thin as of late more mentally than physically. When I get like this, some regular-joe play time is in order. After unplugging with some physical activities like working out and bbq’n, it was pretty easy getting back in to some of the cool tech toys that make PCs fun.

Enter, the Patriot Memory Viper II 2000 MHz (GT-RT10-VR4-R32-WRX-STi-OMFG-NOS) Triple Channel Memory. Ok, you got me. It doesn’t really use NOS to run fast, but you’d think so with the way it operates on a humble little ASRock X58 Extreme motherboard.

Right from boot, the motherboard insisted on running the memory at 1066 MHz (via BIOS and CPUZ) which is actually 2133 MHz because it’s double data rate RAM. That’s as far as the RAM would go with this BIOS which is the norm with the X58 Chipset and Intel Core i7 processors.

Between the Auto overclocked settings in the BIOS and memory, SANDRA’s memory benchmark test posted 34,654 MB/s (or, 34.6 GB/s) almost consistently. You can see on the stickers that these run stock 8-8-8-24 memory timings. Between those timings and 2000 MHz, you can get a lot of things done sooner than later. That bandwidth makes for extremely quick Photoshop and/or video rendering.

On the non-technical side of the things, the new Viper II memory sinks are pretty dang nice. The original Viper resembled fangs which were great for an intro. The Viper II sinks return to a more contemporary, well manicured fin design.

If you’re looking for something a little less elite to save some cash, check out their new Patriot Gamer Series. The timings are a little higher, but they accomplish the same objective in any video game. The memory comes in Dual and Triple Channel flavors supporting AMD AM2 and AM3, as well as Intel Core 2 and Core i7.

Alright, enough blabbering. It’s time to load up World at War or Left for Dead. This Zotac GTX295 needs heating up!