AndreYang of XS manage to get his hands dirty with an upcoming Asus* motherboard. It looks really nice, with a new chipset from Chipzilla and supporting DDR3. AndreYang posted lots of pictures, but not benchmark results due to NDA. Be ready for some pic loving post over at XS, check it out...
This is the second part of the article I started a couple of days ago. If you haven't seen it yet, I suggest to check it out as I have put in lots of information in there. I have also submitted my 3DMark06 score over at hwbot.org, and sadly, it never really got too far.
Memory: While I always drool for two sticks of 1GB OCZ DDR2 PC2-7200 Special Ops Edition, lack of $$$ and availability prohibited me. If not for FUGGER of XS, I would have not been able to acquire this memory, free of charge. Thanks FUGGER and XS, you and the forum rocks! Anyway, back to the memory, it has a pretty good timings of CL4-4-4-15 at DDR2-800MHz at 1.9v. It'll be the first time I'll be using this memory and it's fresh right out of the box. I am expecting it to perform much better than Apacer Value RAM. As such, let me report the new test set up:
I have posted their younger brother before, but now it's even faster. OCZ* is officially announcing their latest products to hit the market. I really find the cooler very similar to Thermalright's HR-07 cooler. Many may find this a little interesting, some may find it annoying, but one thing is sure, it will have great warranty and support that is to be expected from OCZ. Check them out...OCZ Technology Unveils PC2-9200 Reaper HPC Series, the World’s Fastest Memory with Passive Heatpipe Cooling System
2007-04-03
Sunnyvale, CA—April 3, 2007—OCZ Technology Group, Inc., a worldwide leader in innovative, ultra-high performance and high reliability memory, today announced a high-speed version of the new OCZ Reaper HPC memory line, a PC2-9200 rated kit, making it the world’s fastest memory that takes advantages of the heatpipe design to effectively offload heat and increase performance and stability. This unique Reaper HPC (Heat Pipe Conduit) heatspreader is engineered to deliver superior silent heat dissipation over traditional heatspreaders.
As part of one of OCZ’s high performance memory designs, PC2-9200 Reaper HPC modules are designed to achieve exceptionally high frequencies while maintaining aggressive timings and system stability. The new Reaper DDR2-1150 is the premier, cutting-edge solution for enthusiasts building a performance machine.
“With ultra-high speed memory comes the need for extreme cooling solutions that can be extremely costly or else rely on smart features borrowed from other cooling areas,” commented Dr. Michael Schuette, VP of Technology Development at OCZ Technology. “The Reaper HPC series is the first implementation of heat-pipe technology on memory modules using phase change technology for smart management of the thermal dissipation of one of the world's fastest memory modules, namely the PC2-9200 Reaper.”
The Reaper HPC is an innovative cooling solution developed by OCZ to effectively minimize heat produced by high-speed memory. As heat rises into the thermo-conductive copper heat pipe conduit, it is dissipated through the strategically-placed compact aluminum fin array. By guiding performance-robbing heat away from key memory components, the unique Reaper HPC design helps facilitate improved overclocking performance, while improving longevity and stability of the modules.
The PC2-9200 Reaper HPC modules are optimized for the latest cutting edge motherboards and will be available in 2GB (2x1024MB) dual channel kits. Like all OCZ premium memory, the PC2-9200 Reaper series is backed by a Lifetime Warranty and industry-leading technical support for unparalleled peace of mind.
For more information on the OCZ PC2-9200 Reaper HPC series, please visit our product page here.
SuperTalent, a memory company, has announced that they are joining the lucrative memory market with 4GB capacity and 800MHz speed. That's a lot of RAM, even by today's standard and it should be targetted for those users going for Microsoft* Vista. I am not excited with this announcement, it should have been released sooner rather than later. Anyway, check out their press release.San Jose, California – March 26, 2007 -- Super Talent Technology, a leading manufacturer of DRAM memory modules and flash products, today announced a new 4 GigaByte 800MHz DDR2 memory kit that is ideal for gamers and enthusiasts. The new T800UX4GC5 is a matched pair of 2 GigaByte 800MHz DDR2 non-ECC unbuffered 240-pin DIMMs. This kit has been tested and is guaranteed to operate at 800MHz in a dual channel motherboard at 5-5-5-15 latencies at 2.1 Volts. Each module is constructed using sixteen 128Mbit x 8 FBGA chips organized into a dual-rank 256M x 64 module, and clad in Super Talent’s blue cast aluminum HE heatspreader.
“A fast new breed of affordable gigabit DDR2 IC’s is now making new modules feasible that three months ago were impractical”, stated Joe James, Marketing Director at Super Talent Technology. “This kit is ideal for memory hungry applications running in Windows™ XP x64 and Windows Vista™ Ultimate operating systems, allowing customers a path to 8 GigaBytes of system memory by using two kits”, Mr. James added.
These modules are manufactured and tested in Super Talent’s state-of-the-art Silicon Valley factory. Every Super Talent module built is hand tested in a motherboard under load to ensure the highest level of reliability. The T800UX4GC5 kit will be available this week at an estimated street price of $438.
I stumbled upon a tech site that I am not familiar with, XSreviews. They seemed like a pretty decent site, I have yet to read more articles before I can say if it's good or bad, well, according to my taste. Anyway, they review a good memory from GeIL* which used to be one of my trusted memory manufacturer during the DDR1 days. Check out the site...Conclusion
The Ultra Plus 6400 kit from Geil is an absolutely fantastic overclocker. It has crazy tight timings at stock speeds, but loosen them up and crank up the voltage and you will have some monster overclocks on the horizon. The fact that this is a 1gb kit will hold back those looking to game with this kit but anyone looking to spec up a solid Athlon64 or P4 rig would be well advised to think of the Geil Ultra series 1gb kit.
LegitReviews has a pretty RAM on their test bench. It doesn't have flashy LEDs or crazy design for its heatspreader, but the style is just sexy. If you are craving for some RAM review, check this out and see if it suits your taste.Conclusion and Final Thoughts
This Cell Shock DDR2 1000 2GB kit was a great memory kit to be introduced to. The memory modules that I was able to use were found to be of high quality and featured a unique design to the heat spreader. More specifically, it uses the ever popular Micron D9GKX memory IC's, is built on an 8 layer PCB and it has a classy, yet well built heatspreader. It performed very well, in fact, very comparable to our Corsair ram that we tested against, so it is certainly able to hang with the big names here in the United States.
Overclocking results were actually pretty good, and gave a good boost in performance. With the option to link or unlink ram these days on the newer motherboard chipsets, it means that tweaking is nearly endless when using a pair of modules like these! This makes it fun for the most detailed of enthusiast, and this Cell Shock plays nice at various timings and voltages.
I was only able to find this memory at one online store in the US, at Tankguys.com. They have it priced at $419.00, which seems like a pretty penny, but numerous other brands are asking this much, if not more, for comparable memory kits these days. The one thing that concerns me the most with the price tag on this memory kits is that it ONLY comes with a 5-year warranty. In an industry where everyone else has lifetime warranties on their modules this is an interesting move. For a ~$400 memory kit one would expect that it would have a lifetime warranty, but this one does not.
The Legit Bottom Line:
This Cell Shock DDR2 1000 2GB kit is certainly worthy of your time and attention if you are in the market for ram. It performs great, overclocks decent. The only drawback may be the warranty and price for a relative unknown in the US market... the sticker price might just give you "Cell Shock," but remember, you get what you pay for!
