These times are good times, at least for those in the market for some new memory sticks. When Winbond stopped the production of their BH-5/6 series we saw manufactures change to memory chips which featured more relaxed timings. Where Winbond could keep tightest timings at CL2 2-2-5 the next generation had to make do with CL2 2-3-6.

The performance difference between CL2 2-2-5 and CL2 2-3-6 is far from shocking, but hardware enthusiast tend to want to best what’s out there.

Lucky for us where Winbond dropped the ball, Samsung picked it up and recently introduced a new batch of memchips capable of those tight timings. Today we have a collection of 1Gb PC3200 kits from different brands which all use those shiny new Samsung chips.



PC-Memory-Upgrade.co.uk, Mushkin and GSkill provided us the following:

G.Skill GSKILL F1-3200DSU2-1GBLE	Mushkin PC3200 LVLII V2	PDP PC3200 Patriot Xtreme
OCZ EL PC3200 Platinum Revision 2	A-DATA PC4800	OCZ's EL PC4400 Gold

The only memory stick included in this roundup not sporting Samsung’s latest is OCZ’s EL PC4400 Gold which features Hynix BTD5, rated at 275Mhz CL2.5 4-4-8.

Let’s start up our Intel test rig ->

Test Setup

JMke's Intel Test Setup
CPU	Intel P4 2.4 "C"
Mainboard	Asus P4C800 (Bios 1019 Beta003)
Cooling	TTIC NPH-1
Video	nVidia Geforce FX5900XT

Past experience with this particular setup showed that the maximum stable FSB was 260Mhz, the Asus board is holding us back from reaching higher speeds.

To search the higher limit of FSB speeds a new A64 setup was bought: DFI NF3 250gb and A64 3200+ CG stepping; Performance on that platform with the memories tested here will appear in a future article.

I included one pair of generic 512Mb sticks with CL3 4-4-8 timings to show the difference at stock speeds.

Benchmarks at 200Mhz tightest timings

All memory could run CL2 2-2-5 at 200Mhz / PC3200 speeds without issue, the OCZ EL PC4400 would not work at timings lower then CL2 3-3-5.



All results are pretty even, the tighter timings give a ~2.5% difference in performance.



Again a ~2.5% increase



In this synthetic benchmark we see a larger difference of ~4%, the OCZ EL PC4400 also wins by a larger margin on the generic memory.



The Flyby benchmark run is more graphics card dependant, the Botmatch reflect the overall system speed more, 2 FPS is what you gain.

So far for the benchmarks at “stock” speeds, let’s start overclocking ->

Benchmarks at highest speed using tightest timings

Overclocking these Samsung TCCD “f” revisions chips proved to be quite different from others when it came down to voltage tolerances. Whereas Winbond’s chip loved high voltage up to 3.6VDDR, you generally won’t gain any overclockability going past 2.8v. There is also potential to decrease OC at volts even from 2.7-2.8v. Keep in mind to vary vdimm through all testing to make sure your set is being given the voltage that best fits your individual modules. That said, according to a member of a performance ram manufacturer, recent production of TCCD based chips could potentially benefit from voltages over 3.1v. The memory sticks in this roundup did not react to these higher voltages, leading me to believe they still have the earlier revision.

The OCZ EL PC4400 sticks were also tested with different voltage settings with the aid of an OCZ DDR Voltage Booster unit, but no difference in performance was obtained by going from 2.7 to 3+ VDDR.

In this first OC test we leave the timings at CL2 2-2-5 (except for the OCZ PC4400) and by using Memtest86+ 1.27 try to find the sweet spot for each pair of memory sticks, we then booted into Windows at the maximum speed and ran through our benchmarks to check on stability, PiFast, 3Dmark2001SE, Sisoft Sandra 2004 and UT2003 were used to evaluate performance increases.



While most sticks delivered equal performance, it was OCZ Platinum Rev2 which takes the lead here. The OCZ PC4400 scores high here due to its more relaxed timings.



PiFast not only likes low timings, but also high CPU speeds, this explains the lead of OCZ PC4400 gigabyte kit. Plat Rev2 follows closely.



The OCZ Plat Rev2 takes the lead again, but only with a small margin.



Sisoft Benchmark reflects the results from the 3DMark2001SE run.



Here performance difference in Flyby is negligible, but the Botmatch sees a larger difference between the top performer and the rest of the pack!

Overclocking at tight timings with the Samsung TCCD tested today does not make us relive the Winbond days of yore, with an average of 209-216Mhz it’s a far cry from those 230-240Mhz overclocks.

Is this current crop of Samsung TCCD no good then? Let’s turn the page ->

Benchmarks at highest speed using loose timings

In our second testing round we relax timings to CL2.5 3-3-7, again we run Memtest86+ to check on system stability in combination with the whole benchmark suite. These are the results:



Remember that my P4 setup maxes out at 260Mhz, it’s normal that the OCZ EL PC4400 reaches this speed without issue, it’s rated at 275Mhz after all.

Both G.Skill and A-DATA are confident enough to rate their memory modules for operation over 275Mhz, the A-DATA’s DDR600 is even capable of 300Mhz (although maybe not in Dual Channel), if your motherboard and CPU allows it. Preliminary tests on the A64 setup show this to be true when using a single module.

The real surprise is seen with the other sticks, they all gain quite a remarkably increase in overclockability. The Mushkin is trailing the pack, but can hardly be called a bad performer, its lower overclock might be contributed to PCB design and TCCD revision used on the module, I’ve seen the same Mushkin modules reach 259Mhz at these timings in this review.






In the results above we see the Mushkin trailing the pack due to its lower overclock, still performance over stock greatly increased.

Performance Summary

Using the UT2003 botmatch results as a guideline, we can see each memory kit perform well beyond specifications using both tight and relaxed timings. The fact that all these results could be had with VDDR within reach of most people makes it very interesting.



Conclusion

When the first overclocking tests were performed with relaxed timings on the P4 test platform a ceiling was hit quite rapidly. Where memory modules rated at PC3200 in the past usually stopped at 230-250Mhz no matter what timings were used, we see these new Samsung TCCD powered sticks push past this barrier with ease.

Picking up hardware with the intention for overclocking will always be a hit and miss; this guessing game can be reduced by making a more informed buying decision by reading through online reviews and visiting enthusiast’s forums. But even then you can end up with hardware which does not perform like you saw it done elsewhere. In this roundup we had 3x PC3200 kits giving different OC results, although they all shared the same memory chips. Optimized PCB design can influence performance but "that" much. Just being lucky still plays a large role.

If your system can handle it and you certainty about the memory’s performance, then you will be better of with higher rated modules from G.Skill, A-DATA and OCZ, these feature hand picked memory chips which are tested to work at rated speed and timings. If you want to take a chance and save a bit of money then you can’t go wrong with the lower rated sticks from Mushkin, OCZ and PDP.



Looking at prices found at PC-Memory-Upgrade you’ll notice 2 interesting facts.

2x512Mb A-DATA DDR600: €364
2x512Mb OCZ EL PC4400 Gold: €399
2x512Mb G.Skill PC3200/PC4400: ~€300 (average of prices at different resellers listed at G.SKill's website)

2x512Mb Mushkin PC3200 LVL2 Rev2: €328
(Mushking is offering a -10% of $283 if you order directly here and enter the code "HALF")

2x512Mb OCZ EL PC3200 Plat Rev2: €318
2x512Mb PDP PC3200 Patriot EB: €270

1) Price difference between higher rated and lower rated memory modules is not too big
2) The lesser known brands are selling their goods for a remarkably lower price

So it will come down to availably near your home, the local price and product support, Mushkin and OCZ are known brands to hardware enthusiast, the others are less known and have yet to prove themselves as they are joining the DDR battle fields with very competitive products. Time will tell if service and support is on par with their hardware’s performance.

In our upcoming roundup on the Athlon64 we’ll delve further into the Samsung TCCD memory chips world.

If you want great performance and you’re in the market for new memory then make sure you get the latest Samsung TCCD powered sticks from your favourite brand.

Madshrimps would like to thank Lee from Mushkin and Cindy from G.Skill for giving us the opportunity to evaluate their products.



Jakob from PC-Memory-Upgrade.co.uk who set us up with the OCZ, A-DATA and PDP modules let us know that he’s sponsoring and upcoming give-away. So make sure to check back to win one of these high performance kits!

Questions/Comments: forum thread

Updated forum thread with memory modules featuring Samsung TCCD "f" here

Highest Memory OC record table here , with TCCD F at 366Mhz CL3-6-6-15 !! (screenie)