Patriot Viper III Review: 2x4 GB at DDR3-2400 C10-12-12 1.65 V
by Ian Cutress on November 18, 2013 1:00 PM ESTPatriot Viper III 2x4GB DDR3-2400 C10 Conclusions
When purchasing memory, it all comes down to speed and cost. What speed works best for your workload / gaming preferences, and where can you get the cheapest that won’t break after two minutes? As I mentioned in our previous review, DDR4 is around the corner (one to two years), so if you are building a desktop system today, this may be the final DDR3 kit you will buy, so it helps to make it a good one.
When forming a conclusion around the Patriot 2x4 GB 2400 C10 kit we have tested, one of the most important details is frustratingly absent: the price. As mentioned in the review, typically we search Newegg for pricing, but this kit is not listed. We find it on Amazon.com for $117, or going back to Newegg, the slightly slower 2400 C11 version of the kit (Performance Index of 218 vs 240) is $92. When comparing to other 2x4 GB 2400 C10 kits available on Newegg, $117 is by far the most expensive. Even $92 is about $10-$15 too high, as the cheapest comes in at $73 and most of the rest are $82-88.
For this memory kit to be competitive with others, it needs to find a pricing niche in the $70-80 range. At that price it undercuts most of the competition, and fits in under the $10/GB marker.
In this review we tested 2x4 GB and 4x4 GB configurations, and the benchmark results in our tests were pretty much unchanged. If anything, having more sticks of memory with no increase in memory bandwidth caused a slight but almost unnoticeable dip in certain benchmarks (particularly Compute). But in situations where memory was needed, the larger configuration would provide a boost.
Overclocking wise, I was glad to see that this memory kit easily moved from 2400 C10 to 2666 C10, indicating a performance index boost from 240 to 267. The PI of 267 was an apt marker for command rates from 7-10, providing some headroom should users require it, and 267 is around the highest mark we will see from DDR3 for a stable purchasable retail kit (a 3100 C12 exists on Newegg, PI of 258, for $1000).
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julandorid - Monday, November 18, 2013 - link
Thanks for the review, but what exactly "featured review" means?IanCutress - Monday, November 18, 2013 - link
That's a little tagline we can attach to the front page articles when they're on the top.Wall Street - Monday, November 18, 2013 - link
I think that it is the opposite of capsule review. A featured review is a.k.a. a full review.TemjinGold - Monday, November 18, 2013 - link
Whoa... why is the 2X4 by GSkill $520?IanCutress - Monday, November 18, 2013 - link
DDR-3000 C12: you have to bin a lot of ICs to get ones with the right voltage/performance characteristics for that kit. Same reason why the more expensive CPUs are also the faster (in MHz numbers or cores) than the cheaper ones.ShieTar - Tuesday, November 19, 2013 - link
True. But you can get DDR 2666 with CL10 for about 100€, so a set with an 7% shorter access time (higher "PI" as Ian insists on calling it), and only a 11% lower transfer rate for about a fifth of the price.The 500$ kit seems to be exclusively for those who don't have to work for their money, or maybe those who are hunting records as a hobby.
DanNeely - Tuesday, November 19, 2013 - link
The very top of the line always is extremely expensive, and - when it's the result of extreme binning - has to be in order to limit demand to the miniscule supply available.Gen-An - Tuesday, November 19, 2013 - link
Exactly, they have to test the ICs individually with those tester kits and bin them for speed. I just find it amazing that a chip that is designed for say, 1600 C11 at 1.5v has the potential to run 3100 C12 with 1.65v, that's nearly double its rated clock speed with a mere 0.15v bump in voltage.sf101 - Monday, December 9, 2013 - link
If you want 2400 guaranteed out of the box you pay the premiums.most of the 2133 mhz black momba sticks could also do 2666mhz @ 10-13-10-30-2t but your voltages may vary.
And more than likely some of that is because of individual IMC tolerances per cpu.
Franzen4Real - Monday, November 18, 2013 - link
When it comes to memory, over the years I have tried to read up on different reviews and look at benchmarks in an attempt to understand when it is better to run tighter timings/lower MHz as opposed to looser timings/higher bandwidth. I'm sure it is a case by case basis, but was wondering if the always knowledgeable and helpful Anandtech commenters could give me a quick, dummy terms, explanation of when tight timings or clockspeed is better? Looking at your graph, it shows the C7 1866 through C10 2666 all having the same performance index score, but what situations do those different timings/MHz become better/worse? I hope this isn't too in depth of a question.I don't know if this analogy is correct, but I'm seeing it as if RAM was a race car on a track, high bandwidth/loose timings would mean your car travels faster, but has to do more laps around the track to complete. Tight timings/lower bandwidth means the car travels slower but doesn't have to do as many laps to complete. If I am correct on this, at what point does less laps trump traveling faster?
As a side note, I am looking to build a Haswell desktop in Jan/Feb. It will have one GPU (probably one of the R9's) and more than likely a 2x8gb RAM kit. My usage would very roughly be 70% gaming, 25% rendering in 3DS Max and using some Adobe programs, 5% or less video encoding. I'm looking for help in deciding what to look for in this scenario, but also to finally have a better understanding of how these settings affect different workloads.
Sorry for the wall of text!!