OCZ 3500EB: The Importance of Balanced Memory Timings
by Wesley Fink on April 7, 2004 12:04 AM EST- Posted in
- Memory
Test Results: OCZ 3500EB
To test overclocked stability, we used the very demanding Gun Metal 2 - Benchmark 2, which pushes systems with its DX9 routines. To be considered stable for test purposes, Gun Metal, our Quake3 benchmark, UT2003 Demo, Super PI, Halo, and Comanche 4 had to complete without incident. Any of these, and in particular Super PI and Gun Metal, will crash a less-than stable memory configuration.| OCZ 3500EB (DDR433) - 2 x 512MB Double-Bank | |||||
| Speed | Memory Timings & Voltage | Quake3 fps | Sandra UNBuffered | Sandra Standard Buffered | Super PI 2M places (time in sec) |
| 400DDR 800FSB |
2.5-2-3-5 2.5V |
322.2 | INT 2735 FLT 2782 |
INT 4456 FLT 4459 |
131 |
| 433DDR 866FSB |
2.5-2-3-5 2.65V |
350.4 | INT 3009 FLT 3018 |
INT 4856 FLT 4867 |
121 |
| 466DDR 933FSB |
3-2-3-5 2.65V |
376.5 | INT 3216 FLT 3241 |
INT 5204 FLT 5215 |
113 |
| 500DDR 1000FSB |
3-2-3-5 2.85V |
403.3 | INT 3457 FLT 3501 |
INT 5580 FLT 5586 |
104 |
| 510DDR 1020FSB |
3-2-3-6 2.85V |
408.1 | INT 3516 FLT 3557 |
INT 5715 FLT 5718 |
102 |
At DDR433, OCZ 3500EB clearly meets its specifications. We were able to run our complete memory test suite at the SPD timings with no problem. We did achieve the best performance on the Intel test bed, however, with the lowest Cycle Time (tRAS) that we could run. Therfore, the best performance on an Intel chipset was with the lowest possible tRAS, which is reported in the chart.
It is also worth mentioning that OCZ 3500EB was completely stable at 2.5-2-3 timings to DDR460. Above 460, we needed to raise our CAS setting to CAS 3 for most stable performance. However, across the DDR400 to DDR510 range we were able to maintain a tRP (RAS Precharge) of 2, and a tRCD (RAS-to-Cas Delay) value of 3.
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Pumpkinierre - Sunday, April 11, 2004 - link
Still waiting for my OCZ IC7 link WesleyTrogdorJW - Thursday, April 8, 2004 - link
bldkc... Not really. Only people overclocking their CPUs to extreme highs are pushing memory at the 500+ MHz range. The fastest official speeds are still DDR400, and DDR2 will probably be necessary before we gain official support for DDR466 and/or DDR533. I'm just waiting for DDR666.... eeeevil! Oh, wait, they'll call it DDR667 to appease the Bible thumpers.On a tangent, I'm an active Christian, and I find this "fear" of 666 to be rather absurd. "The number of the beast shall be six hundred sixty-six." Yeah, and the beast is apparently some computer part... or it would be if we had a 666 MHz CPU/RAM/Bus/whatever. Okay, on with life....
bldkc - Wednesday, April 7, 2004 - link
It wasn't long ago that we were asking the Processor Gods when they were going to catch up to the RAM Gods and use all that big bandwidth they were selling. Well here we are. Now we must pray that the Ram Gods will treat us kindly, and return the favor.Wesley Fink - Wednesday, April 7, 2004 - link
Adul -I will include some Athlon 64 results in an upcoming A64 board review. I did check compatibility with A64, which was excellent even on VIA K8T800, which can be very picky about memory and timings. Also took a brief look at A64 performance, and found best performance timings on A64 nF3 were 2.5-2-3-9 as mentioned in the review.
RyanVM - Wednesday, April 7, 2004 - link
And what if due to past transgressions, many (including myself) still don't trust anything OCZ puts their name on?Adul - Wednesday, April 7, 2004 - link
Any chance to get some test results on a Athlon 64 wes?grunjee - Wednesday, April 7, 2004 - link
Where the heck can I get some of this stuff??? Been looking and haven't been able to find any.Great review btw Wesley.
bigtoe33 - Wednesday, April 7, 2004 - link
I have an unbuffered available on bleedinedge forum.http://www.bleedinedge.com/forum/showthread.php?t=...
this shows turbo enabled on an IC7.
Spacecomber - Wednesday, April 7, 2004 - link
I was left wondering if you would see the same benefit from the enhanced bandwidth with Athlon Systems as you do with the Pentium 4 system that was used in the benchmarks.I've gathered that the rule of thumb is that Pentium 4s enjoy all the memory bandwidth that you can feed them, while Athlon XP systems are less bandwidth starved and do better with the lowest latencies you can run.
So, I'm wondering if this new OCZ memory will be of most benefit to people running Pentium 4 systems, especially overclocked 800MHz systems, but less (if any advantage) to Athlon users. I also wonder if there is any difference in benefits between an Athlon 64 and the regular Athlon with this memory, for that matter.
These are the kind of practical questions I'm still left with after reading the article. On the other hand, the article gets high praise for bringing this new memory to our attention.
Wesley Fink - Wednesday, April 7, 2004 - link
Pumkinierre -Our memory test bed is the Asus P4C800-E, and we have not tested EB on the Abit IC7. However, OCZ Tech Support tells us they achieve even better benchmark results with EB on the Abit IC7. I will try to provide a link to their test results on the IC7 later today.