Mushkin PC4000 High Performance: DDR500 PLUS
by Wesley Fink on September 26, 2003 11:49 AM EST- Posted in
- Memory
Shortly after our DDR500 roundup Searching for the Memory Holy Grail — Part 2 appeared, Mushkin sent us samples of their prototype DDR500. While that early Mushkin DDR500 did meet specifications, it was not very competitive with the best DDR500, so Mushkin continued working on further revisions to their PC4000 memory. A few days ago, we received Mushkin’s latest update to their DDR500.
The new memory will be called PC4000 High Performance, and our testing indicates that the new memory is another Universal High-Speed DIMM like the Corsair XMS4000PRO we recently tested. What we mean by Universal High-Speed is that the memory is very competitive at DDR500, but that it also performs at DDR400 with aggressive CAS2 timings. Early DDR500 does well at the high end, but at DDR400, you are often stuck with CAS2.5 or CAS3 timings, which perform poorly at DDR400 compared to the fastest DDR400 modules.
The Mushkin PC4000 High Performance came with purple Aluminum Heatsinks over Mushkin’s trademark black PCB, but Mushkin says you may or may not receive the same purple heatsinks. Mushkin uses Revision B Hynix memory chips in the manufacture of the new PC4000, which are the same chips used by Corsair in their new XMS4000 PRO.
Mushkin did not use flashing LEDs or any other distinguishing packaging with PC4000 High Performance. However, the purple heatspreaders that we received certainly stood out and reminded us that purple is the color of royalty.
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Anonymous User - Sunday, October 5, 2003 - link
Please start testing this goodness on a Athlon XP2500+ Barton. I have no problem reaching 240FSB on my ABIT NF7 S.V2 XP2500 Barton setupAnonymous User - Wednesday, October 1, 2003 - link
Still dissapointed that you didnt test with Athlon. Would it have hurt? Just to see what happened?Parasitic - Wednesday, October 1, 2003 - link
Dear audience and the reviwer,I just feel that nForce2 users are overlooked by this review - not to say that this isn't a great one, another excellent job by the staff.
However, I resent the criticism on that AMD users have no need for DDR500. With the new Bartons and nForce2 400/Ultra chipsets, DDR400 and above have become popular in the eyes of system builders.
Given the proper SPP voltage on the nForce2 or nForce2 400/Ultra, most unlocked processors like Thoroughbreds can hit pretty close to the 200MHz barrier, and it's a necessity to utilise DDR400 at that point. Like I mentioned earlier, with Bartons the road to 200FSB has become easier to walk on. Excuse my exaggeration, but it is almost a sin not to run Bartons beyond the 200FSB.
If a futher investigations are looked, a lot of enthusiasts are purchasing, at a minimum, low-latency DDR400, with PC3500/PC3700 being the norm. This also applies to AMD users especially those of us with nForce2.
Given the PCI lock, nForce2 is the overclocker's jewel for AMD setups. A group of us have already breached 233FSB, with occasional news of reaching 250FSB. Some motherboards even offer up to 300MHz of FSB adjustment in 1MHz increments.
I understand that Intel's Canterwood and Springdale are highly popular in the top-end crowd right now; but a study on DDR500 should not be overlooked by the staff of Anandtech, one of the more respected and popular tech sites on the web. Please spare the "what about the commoners" criticism - we are tech-savvy people, and given that we voluntarily choose to read tech sites like Anandtech already introduces a bias into the popular of users reading critical on memory sticks.
Thank you for your attention.
Anonymous User - Monday, September 29, 2003 - link
Guys the new OCZ PC4000 Universal ram is here.I have the new PC4000 that runs 2-3-3-5 at ddr400 and tops out well over ddr533 with 2.5-4-4-7 timings.At the moment though I still feel OCZ3700 is the fastest at 250fsb with 2-3-3-7 timings at 3Vdimm.Anyway, excelent review as usual Wes, keep up the good work.
Tony
Anonymous User - Sunday, September 28, 2003 - link
The quality if geil ram is questionnable. Also they have poor consumer service.DragonReborn - Saturday, September 27, 2003 - link
Any reason not to get the Geil 4200 over the 4000 with a 2.4/Watercooled setup? The geil is the only reasonably priced ram...Wesley Fink - Friday, September 26, 2003 - link
DDR500+ Memory is currently an Intel 865/875 need. Myshkin tests DDR500 performance on Intel 865/875 boards and tests DDR400 performance on nForce2, Intel, and VIA chipsets.We ONLY tested this memory on an Intel platform. After testing, however, it perfroms fast enough at DDR400 that it could be a good choice for nF2 boards - with headroom for the future.
TheInvincibleMustard - Friday, September 26, 2003 - link
On the bottom of page 3, you state that performance on an Athlon nForce2 Ultra 400 was not tested for the Mushkin PC4000, but one page previous you say that it IS tested on an nForce2 Ultra 400 ... is that because those are what Mushkin tests the memory on itself, or was this a misprint of some sort? The only things you tested this memory on were the Intel-based boards listed at the bottom of page 3, correct?Wesley Fink - Friday, September 26, 2003 - link
We have looked at OCZ 4000 Gold, but we did not do another review because performance was virtually identical to the OCZ4000 Copper Engineering Samples we tested in an earlier review. It is outstanding DDR500 memory and produced the highest overclock in our DDR500 roundup. However, it does not perform as fast at DDR400 as the Mushkin PC4000 High Performance tested here, Corsair XMS4000 PRO, or OCZ 3700 GOLD (which is based on lasered Samsung chips and not Hynix). We have asked OCZ about products using the newest Hynix chips, and they say they will likely release a similar product, or maybe something even faster, in the near future.Anonymous User - Friday, September 26, 2003 - link
p.s. i forgot ocz pc4000 gold is available over here http://www.hardcorecooling.us/product.asp?0=200&am...