ADATA 16GB XPG DDR3-2600 CL11 Memory Review

We recently published the ADATA XPG DDR3-2800 memory review which consisted of a kit based on single-sided Hynix MFR IC. Overall performance was lower than expected, even though overclocking was solid and memory clock was high. Today, we take a look at another Hynix MFR IC based kit, the ADATA XPG DDR3-2600, but it’s double sided and gives us 16 GB total. What does ADATA have to offer with a 16 GB DDR3-2600 memory kit? We’ll find out the difference between single and double-sided modules and how it affects performance in this review.

Specification and Photo Gallery

As most available memory kits on the market, our ADATA XPG came also in blister-type package which protects the memory pretty well.

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Inside the package we find two 8 GB ADATA DDR3-2600 memory sticks protected by well known Gaming series heatspreaders…

ADATA XPG 16GB DDR3-2600
ADATA XPG 16GB DDR3-2600

I think that some readers already noticed one thing about which I have to add a note:

This memory won’t be available on the market in the same form as our review sample. Since we have received an early version, you can expect exactly the same modules (so the same PCB and IC ) to be part of latest XPG V2 series that you can see here or in our last ADATA XPG DDR3-2800 review mentioned earlier. Simply, the only difference is new heatspreader design which will be yellow/gold or gray/silver.

Specification

  • Product Number:  AX3U2600GW8G11-DG2
  • Rated speed:  DDR3-2600 / PC3-20800
  • Density:  2×8 GB ( Dual Channel )
  • SPD Profile:  1600 9-9-9-24 1.50 V
  • XMP Profile:  2600 11-13-13-35 1.65 V

ADATA programmed only one XMP profile which can be seen below.

ADATA XPG 16GB 2600 - XMP #1
ADATA XPG 16GB 2600 – XMP #1

This is how our testing motherboard, Gigabyte Z87X-OC, sees this memory running at XMP #1 profile. Worth noting is the Command Rate being set to 1T even though it’s high density memory which usually has this timing set to 2T. Memory voltage is 1.65V which is already standard for most DDR3-2400+ RAM.

As it was already mentioned, ADATA XPG DDR3-2600 16 GB is based on double-sided Hynix MFR IC. More precisely it’s H5TQ4G83MFR PBC. We can find detailed specification of this chip on the Hynix website. Probably the most interesting for overclockers will be the maximum safe voltage up to 1.975 V and normal operating temperature up to 85 °C. Simply way above regular values and gives us a chance at higher overclocking.

ADATA XPG 16GB 2600 - Hynix MFR IC
ADATA XPG 16GB 2600 – Hynix MFR IC

Let’s take a closer look at memory kit itself…

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Stability Testing

As usual on Overclockers.com, we are starting with stability testing at the declared manufacturer settings. To perform these tests we are using UltraX R.S.T. Pro3:

R.S.T. Pro3 is the definitive memory diagnostic and validation tool designed for the rigorous testing needs of desktop & server memory manufacturers, system builders, design engineers, and service professionals.

R.S.T. Pro3 identifies memory defects that may have passed every usual manufacturing test, but which can still fail in normal use. A major advantage of R.S.T. Pro3 compared to stand alone testers, is the capability of testing and validating RAM within the system environment, testing for Behavioral failures that are sensitive to system idiosyncrasy. Quickly isolate intermittent failures that do not necessarily prevent a system from booting, but surface during extended testing sessions.

UltraX R.S.T. Pro3
UltraX R.S.T. Pro3

ADATA XPG 16 GB DDR3-2600 has passed this test flawlessly five times as we can see on the screenshot below. Since we are sure that memory is perfectly stable, we can continue with performance testing.

UltraX R.S.T. Pro3 - Test Result
UltraX R.S.T. Pro3 – Test Result

Performance Testing

Test System

  • Intel Core i7 4770K @ 4.2 GHz
  • Gigabyte Z87X-OC
  • Corsair HX850, 850 W 80+ Silver PSU
  • Crucial M4 64 GB AHCI
  • Windows 7 Ultimate

Memory kits:

  • Crucial Ballistix Sport XT 2×8 GB DDR3-1866 10-10-10-30
  • Geil Veloce 2×4 GB DDR3-2133 10-11-11-30
  • Kingston HyperX 10th Anniversary 4x4GB DDR3-2400 11-13-13-30
  • G.Skill TridentX 2×4 GB DDR3-2400 10-12-12-31
  • Team Group Xtreem 2×4 GB DDR3-2666 11-13-13-35
  • ADATA XPG 2×8 GB DDR3-2600 11-13-13-35

All memory kits were set to XMP profile ( highest clocked one ) so settings declared by manufacturer.

Test Software

  • HyperPi 0.99b
  • AIDA64 Memory & Cache benchmark
  • MaxxMem v1.99
  • 7-Zip x64
  • Cinebench 11.5
  • CPU-Z 1.65
  • ASUS MemTweakIT 2.00.01

HyperPi 0.99b

One of most popular benchmarks among overclockers in multi-threaded form. It’s a nice tool to test performance and also stability.

ADATA XPG 16GB 2600 - HyperPi 32M
ADATA XPG 16 GB 2600 – HyperPi 32M

As we see on above graph, optimal memory clock is DDR3-2400 and tight memory timings. G.Skill TridentX is fastest in this test but our review sample of ADATA DDR3-2600 isn’t much slower. Considering that ADATA is higher density memory, the result is pretty good. Team Xtreem memory based on single-sided MFR is starting to show its weak points. Result of this memory is worse even than Crucial 1866 CL10.

MaxxMem v1.99

MaxxMem is a well-known memory benchmark which uses single-threaded operations to measure memory bandwidth. On the Haswell platform, we can see a big difference between single and multi-threading what is worth to mention comparing memory transfers.

ADATA XPG 16GB 2600 - MaxxMem
ADATA XPG 16 GB 2600 – MaxxMem

Memory write bandwidth in this test is clearly limited by CPU speed and all memory kits are achieving similar results – about 24 GB/s. Looking at other results we can see that best overall performance is again G.Skill 2400 CL10 memory. ADATA 2600 CL11 results are not so bad, but aren’t best in any category. The Geil 2133 is interesting, being one of the lowest clocked memory kits in comparison achieved the best result in the memory copy test, which was more than 1 GB/s better than the second best result.

AIDA64 Cache & Memory Benchmark

Latest version of AIDA64 introduced new set of multi-threaded tests. As we see bandwidth is much higher than for MaxxMem or older AIDA64 versions so we can’t compare those results.

ADATA XPG 16GB 2600 - AIDA64
ADATA XPG 16 GB 2600 – AIDA64

ADATA XPG memory looks pretty good in memory write bandwidth, where it’s the best kit in this comparison. Since writes are going up with CPU clock, we can expect much better results during higher CPU frequencies. Read transfers aren’t so good mainly because of higher density sticks which forces the loosening of some sub-timings by the manufacturer. Copy result could be better, but it doesn’t look bad.

7-Zip x64

7-Zip, as many probably know, is the benchmark included with the popular compression-decompression application. It better shows how memory speed affects daily work.

ADATA XPG 16GB 2600 - 7-Zip
ADATA XPG 16 GB 2600 – 7-Zip

Similar to previous tests, the best is the G.Skill memory, but our ADATA XPG kit also has good results. Differences between all memory kits are higher than expected probably because of new Haswell instructions which makes it a slightly better benchmark than it was on Ivy Bridge.

Cinebench 11.5

Cinebench is popular benchmark based on rendering, so it’s also something that shows affects on daily work more than only synthetic tests.

ADATA XPG 16GB 2600 - Cinebench 11.5
ADATA XPG 16 GB 2600 – Cinebench 11.5

In this benchmark, we have totally different and unexpected results. The best result is from the Crucial Ballistix Sport XT 1866 memory, lowest clocked kit in our comparison. I ran the test a few times to be sure about the results and every time it was about the same. ADATA XPG 2600 memory nearly has the best result, but it’s hard to compare real performance in this benchmark as all results are really close to each other.

Overclocking

It was mentioned couple of times already, but I will say that again. ADATA XPG DDR3-2600 is memory based on double-sided Hynix MFR, which means it won’t overclock as high as single-sided kits. In this case, we exchange the chance for higher clocks for higher performance. I can say it’s not that bad of a deal as performance isn’t scaling well at higher memory clocks because you have to set more relaxed timings.

ADATA XPG 16GB 2600 - OC
ADATA XPG 16 GB 2600 – OC

Keeping standard voltage of 1.65 V and relaxing timings to 12-14-14-37 I was able to set stable 1400 MHz (DDR3-2800). Results at this clock are much better in AIDA64, but not so much in MaxxMem. Simple conclusion can be that single-threaded applications won’t be affected by high speed memory as much as multi-threaded apps.

ADATA XPG 16GB 2600 - OC
ADATA XPG 16 GB 2600 – OC

I see no point in relaxing timings even more just because it’s only lowering performance, but if anyone is curious, below is validation from maximum clock. To be honest, I was expecting a higher clock, but the highest that could boot into Windows was 1466 MHz ( DDR3-2933 ) 12-15-15-37 1.775 V.

ADATA XPG 16GB 2600 - OC
ADATA XPG 16 GB 2600 – OC

Final Thoughts and Conclusion

Recently, we’ve all heard a lot of noise about single-sided Hynix MFR kits breaking world records in DDR3 memory frequency. It didn’t take long for us to see that these kits are great for achieving high frequencies, but at the cost of overall performance. In this review, we see that real overall performance can be had by purchasing double-sided Hynix MFR, like ADATA XMP DDR3-2600.

All who saw bad comments about single-sided kits don’t have to worry in this case. ADATA prepared really fast memory which shows its full performance on Intel Haswell platform.

Haswell is showing optimal performance with memory at around DDR3-2400-2600 clocks. No matter if we use XMP profile or lower clocks to DDR3-2400, we can achieve similar performance and all depends on the programmed (or manually set) memory timings. I think that ADATA could work some more on XMP/SPD profiles as lower clocked Kingston HyperX DDR3-2400 11-13-13-30 was really close with most results. In this case, it’s probably because we tested an early version which may be slightly corrected in the future (or when it hit the stores).

In online stores like Newegg.com , the ADATA XPG V2 DDR3-2600 11-13-13-35 cost $269.99 which isn’t a low price but in comparing to similar kits it seems reasonable. Similar to DDR3-2800 kits, ADATA reduced retail price of XPG DDR3-2600 memory kit which was nearly $360! You can actually see price drop listed on Newegg under both ADATA XPG DDR3-2600 kits in yellow/gold and gray/silver heatspreaders. If you were already thinking about this or similar memory but price was an issue then $90 price drop will for sure help to decide.

Even though I saw some higher potential in ADATA XPG V2 , it’s pretty good memory. It’s a well-performing 16 GB kit with which I had no issues during the tests. I can recommend it to anyone who is looking for fast memory for the Intel Haswell platform. I doubt that anyone will be disappointed with its performance.

Overclockers_clear_approved

Bartosz Waluk (Woomack)

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S
Sabishiihito

Registered

53 messages 1 likes

Rather disappointing they couldn't clock much higher than 2933. I have a 4x8GB Ripjaws X 2400C11 kit that could run Super Pi 32M at DDR3-3000 12-15-14-35-2T on the Gigabyte Z87X OC Force, which seems to be the only board I've tested that is good at clocking 4 DIMMs.

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Avatar of ivanlabrie
ivanlabrie

Member

6,458 messages 0 likes

I've tested a similar kit on an Ivy bridge rig and I couldn't do better than 2700mhz with stock timings, performance wise. As for clocks, the imc would top out at 2800mhz so, can't comment on that.

Maybe for someone who needs 16gb it isn't such a bad deal, considering the price and specs.

Nice review :salute:

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W
Woomack

Benching Team Leader

13,180 messages 2,183 likes

I was expecting more comments especially that many forum members were curious how double sided MFR are running comparing to single sided.

I was counting on higher OC but I don't think that anyone will buy 16GB memory kit for benching and optimal performance for daily usage on Ivy Bridge or Haswell is at about 2400-2666 memory clock and tighter timings.
ADATA XPG 2600 is running fine also at 2400 10-12-12 1.65V what is better than most available 16GB 2400 kits dedicated for Haswell platform.

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S
Sabishiihito

Registered

53 messages 1 likes

I still hope to see a review of G.Skill's 32GB 2933 or 3000 kits.

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Avatar of ivanlabrie
ivanlabrie

Member

6,458 messages 0 likes

I think it's really interesting, and I'm fairly impressed with Haswell's imc but other than that strong point I wouldn't go for a Haswell rig right now, not even for benching. (budget limitations :()

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Avatar of PolRoger
PolRoger

Member

1,428 messages 15 likes

Thanks for the review. :thup:

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