Mushkin Redline XP4000: Winbond with Voltage Be Damned
by Wesley Fink on May 16, 2005 12:05 AM EST- Posted in
- Memory
Performance Test Configuration
The Mushkin Redline XP4000 was tested with the DFI LANParty nF4 SLI-DR Athlon 64 Socket 939 motherboard. The DFI nForce4 SLI and Ultra are the only current production boards that support the 3.3V to 3.5V rated voltages required for Redline DDR500 performance. An OCZ DDR Booster can be used with motherboards without support for high memory voltages. Other components remain the same as used in the memory setup in Athlon 64 Memory: Rewriting the Rules.The A64 test bed includes components that have been proven in Socket 939 Athlon 64 benchmarking, such as the Socket 939 4000+, and the OCZ Power Stream 520 Power Supply. Since the Athlon 64 tests represent a new series of DDR testing, we have chosen the current generation NVIDIA 6800 Ultra video card for benchmarking. We have found the 6800 Ultra to be a particularly good performance match to NVIDIA motherboards.
All other basic test conditions attempted to mirror those used in our earlier Intel memory reviews. However, test results are not directly comparable to tests performed on the Intel test bed.
| AMD nForce4 Performance Test Configuration | |
| Processor(s): | AMD 4000+ (FX53) Athlon 64 (2.4GHz, Socket 939, 1 MB cache, Dual Channel, 1000HT) |
| RAM: | Mushkin Redline XP4000 (DS) 2X512MB Kingston KVR400X64C25/512 (DS) 2X512MB Kingston KVR400X64C3AK2/1G (DS) 2X512MB Mushkin PC3200 EM (DS) 2X512MB OCZ PC3200 Value Series (VX) (DS) 2X512MB OCZ PC3200 Gold (BH5) (DS) 2X512MB OCZ PC3200 Premier (DS) 2X512MB Transcend JM366D643A-50 (DS) 2X512MB Patriot PC3200+XLBT (DS) 2X512MB OCZ EL PC4000 VX Gold (DS) 2X512MB Corsair TwinX1024-4400C25 (DS) 2X512MB Crucial Ballistix (DS) 2X512MB OCZ PC3200 Platinum Rev 2 (DS) 2X512MB |
| Hard Drives: | Seagate 120GB SATA 7200RPM 8MB Cache |
| PCI/AGP Speed: | Fixed at 33/66 |
| Bus Master Drivers: | NVIDIA nForce Platform Driver 6.53 |
| Video Card(s): | NVIDIA 6800 Ultra 256MB PCIe, 256MB aperture, 1024x768x32 |
| Video Drivers: | NVIDIA Forceware 71.89 Release |
| Power Supply: | OCZ Power Stream 520W |
| Operating System(s): | Windows XP Professional SP2 |
| Motherboard: | DFI LANParty nF4 SLI-DR |
| BIOS: | 3/10/2005 Release |
In past benchmarking, we have found performance of the nForce4 and nForce3 chipsets to be virtually identical, and we have found AGP and PCIe performance to be virtually the same in the benchmarks that we use for memory testing. Therefore, you can also generally compare these results to TCCD benchmarks in recent memory reviews.
With nForce3 motherboards, the fastest performance on AMD Athlon 64 was at a Cycle Time or tRAS of 10. However, the nForce4 behave a bit differently with memory. We ran a complete set of Memtest86 benchmarks with only tRAS varied to determine the best tRAS setting for these memories, and found the best bandwidth at tRAS settings ranging from 5 to 8. Therefore, a tRAS setting of 6 was used for testing.
Test Settings
All AMD Athlon 64 processors are unlocked downward, and the FX CPUs are unlocked up and down. This feature allows a different approach to memory testing, which truly measures performance differences in memory speed alone. All tests were run with CPU speed as close to the specified 2.4GHz of the 4000+/FX53 as possible, with CPU speed/Memory Speed increased at lower multipliers to achieve 2.4Ghz. This approach allows the true measurement of the impact of higher memory speed and timings on performance, since CPU speed is fixed, thereby removing CPU speed as a factor in memory performance.The following settings were tested with the Mushkin Redline XP4000 on the DFI nF4 test bed:
- 2.4GHz-12x200/DDR400 - the highest stock memory speed supported on VIA 939/nF3-4/SiS755-FX motherboards
- 2.4GHz-11x218/DDR436 - a ratio near the standard DDR433 speed
- 2.4GHz-10x240/DDR480 - a ratio near the standard rating of DDR466
- 2.4GHz -9x267/DDR533 - a memory speed achieved by only a few top memories on the Athlon 64
- Highest Memory Performance - the highest memory bandwidth and game performance that we could achieve with the memory being tested; this is rarely the highest memory speed that we could achieve. It is normally a lower speed with 1T Command Rate and tighter memory timings.
We ran our standard suite of memory performance benchmarks: Quake 3, Return to Castle Wolfenstein-Enemy Territory-Radar, Super Pi 2M, and Sandra 2004 Standard and UnBuffered. We also included Everest Home Edition memory tests, free at www.lavalys.com, for read speed, write speed, and Latency.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
41 Comments
View All Comments
devonz - Monday, May 16, 2005 - link
Ok, maybe I'm missing something, but there seems to be no mention of active cooling being necessary for the OCZ VX modules. Is that correct and why would there be such a difference between the two if they are basically the same chips at the same voltage?Joepublic2 - Monday, May 16, 2005 - link
#18, thats why you use memtest86+, prime95 and some type of looping 3d-demo (or the games you play) to confirm stability. My processor has 25% increase over its nominal clock frequency at the default voltage (overvolting is what wears out dialectrics and causes electromitigration, increasing the frequency alone doesn't put any additional stress on the silicon). My motherboard has a 30% increase over the nominal frequence at the default voltage. And my graphics card has a 16% increase on the core and a %10 increase on the memory, but I don't push it because it already runs so damn hot. And yes, I can notice a difference, although admitably only when archiving, extracting and encrypting very large files and when playing demanding 3d games (the only taxing things that I do with my computer). If I did any scientific calculations, CAD/CAM or rendering, it would make a perceptible difference as well. I haven't ever had a program crash, return a bad result, or had the computer crash, either.Tujan - Monday, May 16, 2005 - link
Buffered,Non-Buffered Ram ?Is this two physically different ram modules.? Certainly would want the Buffered results seen if where to have a choice bearing on performance.
Say you purchase 'Redline ''Buffered''""...or Redline ''unbuffered'"" .
What they do here,physically remove the 'unbuffered modules,and replace with 'buffered modules.
The NF4 supports 'buffered,or unbuffered memories ? This is a specific setting to make sure within the BIOS ?
fitten - Monday, May 16, 2005 - link
#17, there is no such thing as "super stable". It's either stable or it isn't. Having "one memory related crash per week" is not a stable system. Besides, with overclocking, the best result you can get is a hard crash because then you know for sure you've pushed something too far.(Before anyone starts yapping about Windows or the like crashes happening more than stability crashes, my Windows XP boxes - I have 3 that run 24/7 - have uptimes as long as the times between patches that require reboots - granted, that isn't as long as I'd like - or power outages - which we've had two in the past month that were down for longer than my UPSs could keep the machines running.)
I used to overclock everything all the time, then I learned a few things about circuits, CPUs, and digital hardware in general and I also grew up. Stability for me is more important than any 10% overclock that I could ever get. Even if I could get a 100% overclock at the cost of stability, I wouldn't take it.
JonB - Monday, May 16, 2005 - link
On a moderately OC'd DDR motherboard at normal voltages, wouldn't these be super super stable? I know the price is extreme, but some applications (like video or sound editing) need stability first, then speed. If it could stop just one memory related crash per week, the extra money would be worth it.ksherman - Monday, May 16, 2005 - link
is it possible to compare DDR1 to DDR2 in these tests? Ive always heard that they were slower because of the latency, but sometimes here on Anandtech, slower sometimes means 3-5% difference, which isnt much...erinlegault - Monday, May 16, 2005 - link
I think the true test of extreme ram will be once we see some OC tests on the Athlon 64 X2. I'm sure two processors can make use of the higher memory bandwidth.Also, looking ahead. Does anybody feel that the active ram cooling of the Abit AN8 Fatal1ty SLI mobo is enough to cool this ram?
JustAnAverageGuy - Monday, May 16, 2005 - link
#12Welcome :)
Brian23 - Monday, May 16, 2005 - link
I agree with ZeboWesley Fink - Monday, May 16, 2005 - link
#1 & #3 - Our Editing engine is inserting spaces randomly. The original does not have these hiccups. Thanks for listing the locations of the extra spaces - they have been corrected. We are trying to find and correct the problem with the inserted spaces