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Corsair TWIN2X1024-8000UL (DDR2-1000)
By Vijay Anand
Category : Memory
Published by Vijay Anand on Wednesday, 6th July, 2005
Rating : 4.5 out of 5 stars  


Conclusion

DDR2 memory has certainly scaled plenty in the recent few months, but Corsair churning out ultra low latency DDR2-1000 modules so soon was a little earlier than expected by many. After all, some of the memory vendors are barely gearing up to churn out standard DDR2-1000 memory modules, but Corsair seems to enjoy snatching the performance speed crown every time someone manages to come close. With the Corsair TWIN2X1024-8000UL matched pair of memory modules, you get two 512MB sticks that are rated for DDDR2-1000 memory frequency and have the lowest latencies ever for that class of memory at 5-4-4-9. Just barely end of last year, most DDR2 memory modules were of the DDR2-533 class sporting timings like 5-5-5-12. It was almost as if memory vendors were secretly competing to see who would debut DDR2-1000 memory first. While Corsair didn't make that record, they were the first to do so with very low latency values and essentially creating an even faster class of DDR2-1000 memory modules in the process. Kudos to the hardworking folks of Corsair.


As outlined on the second page of this article, there are many considerations and limitations to fully utilize DDR2-1000. To sum them up, you'll need an Intel CPU that can work without problems at 300MHz FSB or higher, a motherboard that supports and works at such high frequencies, has a very overclocking-friendly BIOS with all the necessary voltage tweaks to ensure you hit your target, has at least a VDIMM option of 2.2 volts and an appropriate FSB:Memory frequency multiplier to enable you to achieve DDR2-1000 speeds. With so many variables, you'll have to ensure your system can handle all these to make your overclocking a success and take advantage of the speed boost offered by Corsair's TWIN2X1024-8000UL memory pair.

In our tests, we confidently went with the ASUS P5WD2 Premium (Intel 955X) motherboard, but only to find it unable to meet the high overclocking mark required of all the various bus speeds and low latency memory timings. Thankfully, Gigabyte's GA-8I955X Royal (Intel 955X) motherboard came to the rescue with its near flawless low latency DDR2-1000 operation. It even had a 4x memory frequency multiplier that would have enabled DDR2-1066 operation, if the memory modules had adequate headroom. Though we were slightly poignant when we found through our testing that our Corsair memory maxed out at about DDR2-1016, we didn't really expect much in the beginning either since these memory modules are currently the cream of the crop. Hence there's little more that one can wring out of them.

While the performance advantage offered by the Corsair TWIN2X1024-8000UL was decent, considering that it's just an upgrade of one subsystem, the gains are actually good if you were to compare with DDR2-667 and DDR2-533 class of modules. The only issue is finding the right components to bring the best out of the Corsair memory, but seeing that this expensive US$300+ memory pair is targeted at performance seeking-enthusiasts and hardcore gamers, we doubt they'll have the trouble and resources to ensure they make the right purchase decisions. Still, we advise caution and to expect the unexpected since overclocking is never a sure thing, but with memory such as the Corsair TWIN2X1024-8000UL, you've almost effectively ruled out a memory subsystem limitation in your overclocking pursuit.


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Ratings Legend
5.0 Stars Perfect 4.5 Stars Excellent
4.0 Stars Very Good 3.5 Stars Good
3.0 Stars Above Average 2.5 Stars Average / Fair
2.0 Stars Below Average 1.5 Stars Bad
1.0 Star Very Bad 0.5 Star Not Retail Worthy


Testbed Configuration
Processor Intel Pentium 4 XE 3.46Ghz
Mainboard Gigabyte GA-8I955X Royal
Memory Corsair TWIN2X1024-8000UL
Graphics Card Gigabyte GV-NX66TD128D
Harddisk Seagate 7200.7 SATA 80GB
Operating System Windows XP Professional w/ SP1

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