OCZ 3700 GOLD: Building High-Performance Memory
by Wesley Fink on August 7, 2003 8:34 PM EST- Posted in
- Memory
Retail Performance
Both the Samsung stock DIMMs and the Lasered DIMMs were assembled from unbinned chips – chips pulled prior to sorting by performance. The final step is sorting the lasered chips and selecting the best-performing chips for the best-performing memory. Chips that do not meet the highest performance levels are used in lower-speed products.The chips are also only one component in the final performance of the product. The PCB on which the chips are mounted is very important to performance. Six-layer boards are generally lower in noise and the quality of the PCB can significantly impact the performance of the memory DIMM. The programming of the SPD is also very important in determining the final performance of the memory module.
Using the best lasered chips, we finally get to the performance of the completed Retail OCZ 3700 GOLD. In this case, we looked at Maximum Speed at SPD timings, Maximum Speed at CAS2, which is faster than rated SPD CAS of 2.5, and performance at Specifications of DDR466, 2.5-7-3-3.
| OCZ3700 GOLD DS 256Mb Performance Intel 875 Chipset, Dual-Channel, Maximum Overclock |
|||
| DDR Memory Speed | Memory Timings | Memory Voltage (vDIMM) |
UNBuffered Sandra 2003 Memory Test (MB/Second) |
| 466 | Specification 2.5-7-3-3 |
2.65V | 3079 INT 3146 FLT |
| 480 | 2.0-7-3-3 | 2.7V | 3175 INT 3216 FLT |
| 510 | Maximum SPD 2.5-7-3-3 |
2.8V | 3403 INT 3471 FLT |
Speed-sorting of chips yields a retail product that now reaches to a speed of DDR510 at stock SPD timings with a voltage increase to 2.8V. We also see that speed-binning is producing even faster CAS 2.0 settings, up to DDR480. Probably the most significant performance improvement from speed-binning is the memory-bandwidth, as measured by the UNBuffered Sandra 2003 Memory Test.
DDR510 is the highest stable setting that we could achieve at SPD timings, but the memory will reach even higher speeds at more relaxed timings. OCZ 3700 GOLD is one of the many included in our evaluation of high-speed DDR500/DDR466 memory modules. Look for the results in 'Searching for the Memory Holy Grail — Part 2'. Our performance comparison of the fastest memory from Corsair, Kingston, Geil, Adata, and OCZ will be published soon.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
68 Comments
View All Comments
Anonymous User - Wednesday, August 20, 2003 - link
#63, you clearly don't read AT's reviews very closely. Take a look at AT's recent KT600 reviews and you'll see that they continually suggeset purchasing nForce2 U400 motherboards instead. They don't go all out and bash the KT600 motherboard because there IS NO REASON TO. KT600 boards are SLIGHTLY slower, SLIGHTLY poorer overclockers, and come with the same features for a lower price. Sure, enthusiasts will always go with nForce2 U400, but that doesn't make KT600 motherboards terrible, and therefore deserving of a bad review.Yikes, get a clue.
Anonymous User - Tuesday, August 19, 2003 - link
Well, Mushkin is here and pleaes post your questions....Let me know what you need and we will try to assist.You can also post your questions at
http://forums.mushkin.com/phpbb2/
Duonger
Anonymous User - Tuesday, August 19, 2003 - link
Well, Mushkin is here and pleaes post your questions....Let me know what you need and we will try to assist.You can also post your questions at
http://forums.mushkin.com/phpbb2/
Duonger
Anonymous User - Monday, August 18, 2003 - link
What it all boils down to isn't how the memory is made, it is the quality of product.OCZ has a quality product. One OCZ rep in particular, Sean Sinah, has stayed up until 3 AM to personally answer my question. Let's see Corsair or Mushkin do that.
I personally believe that Mushkin, Corsair and OCZ all make good product. Beyond product, OCZ has the customer service.
Anonymous User - Sunday, August 17, 2003 - link
to post #63, so your saying AT can't review anything to do with an Intel or AMD CPU since I see AMD and Intel advertised here, which means they can't use it in any reviews at all, gee you sure are a smart one.Anonymous User - Saturday, August 16, 2003 - link
It doesn't take a genius to search the sites of AT and see that the advertisers products that do get reviewed never get bad ratings. Why is this? Or better yet, why review an advertisers product? Don't you think people won't think something is fishy behind that?Anonymous User - Thursday, August 14, 2003 - link
To clarify that last post, all OCZ advertisements on the website are co-brand advertisements, meaning they do not come from OCZ. For example, the ATACOM banner with OCZ on it is ATACOM promoting their OCZ products.Anonymous User - Thursday, August 14, 2003 - link
#49We do not get paid by OCZ nor will we anytime soon. Unlike other hardware sites (whom OCZ can probably vouche for), we just dont do those kinds of things
Anonymous User - Thursday, August 14, 2003 - link
#49We do not get paid by OCZ nor will we anytime soon. Unlike other hardware sites (whom OCZ can probably vouche for), we just dont do those kinds of things
Anonymous User - Tuesday, August 12, 2003 - link
56, WHO CARES?!!!! Does it run good? Buy it, use it, and be happy for crying our loud! I've never seen so many whiners in all my life...is this what AT is reduced to? :(