gskill z rgb 3000 or 3200, with ASUS Maximus X Code? (opinions)

[flitzanu]

Hi, this is a lovely place. I'm not as heavy into this stuff as I used to be, and I find myself researching well beyond my means and need a bit of advice.

I had settled on the gskill DDR4 2x16 3200 RGB chips, but in reading some of the posts about mild OC and normal speeds and such (I'm a bit dense in most of these things) it seems this is "the chip" to go with, but I just need quick advice.

Is it worth the extra $50 to get the 3200 14cas chips, or stick with the 3000 14cas chips? I know, it's only $50 (which is minimal in considering cost of a complete PC build), but from all that I'm reading on here, I can't tell if it will be worth it, or if i can mildly bump up the 3000 just as easily as the 3200?

So talk to me like I'm a child, and tell me which one I should opt for This is primarily for gaming and live streaming. I won't be pushing this beast up to 5ghz or anything, i might bump up the speed just a tad, but nothing too crazy. I am just stuck reading so many reviews and comparisons on RAM, and at least in this forum, the G.Skill - Trident Z RGB 32GB (2 x 16GB) DDR4-3200 Memory seems to have a very high recommendation. But, if i can save $50 and stick with the 3000mhz, I'll do that. Otherwise, if the 3200 is worth the cost, that was what I was going to get anyway.

Thanks!

this will be going in:

Intel - Core i7-8700K 3.7GHz 6-Core Processor
Asus - ROG MAXIMUS X CODE ATX LGA1151 Motherboard
Thermalright - Le Grand Macho RT 73.6 CFM CPU Cooler
Fractal Design - Define R6 Gunmetal TG ATX Mid Tower Case
EVGA - SuperNOVA G3 850W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply

 

[EarthDog]

If its $50 more, save your money and go 3000 cl14.

 

[Brando]

according to this, the extra $50 will get you almost exactly half a percent performance improvement

https://www.techpowerup.com/reviews...Memory_Performance_Benchmark_Analysis/10.html

 

[Alaric]

Same ICs. There s a good chance you can save the $50, manually enter 3200 MHz in the BIOS and, voila! DDR4 3200 C14. I have the G. Skill Trident Z DDR4 3000 C14 (no RGB) and I'm running it @3733 MHz C15. And that's on a Z170 platform. Save the money. Even if you don't OC it, Brando's post covered what that $50 gets you. That half a percent could be dependent on many other things. You'll never see it IRL.

 

[Mandrake4565]

I concur, save the $50.00!

 

[caddi daddi]

if you're not benching, ram gets you nothing from 1333 to 3000.
save the bucks and put the $50 in your pocket or a better gpu.

 

[Woomack]

3000 14-14-14 and 3200 14-14-14 kits are on the same IC. Only good Samsung IC are used in these kits (I doubt there is anything new that can run at these settings) . No matter which one you pick, both will (probably) OC the same and both will run at 3200 CL14 1.35V or higher.

3200 15-15-15 should be on the same IC too:
https://www.overclockers.com/forums...t-Z-2x16GB-DDR4-3200-CL15-F4-3200C15D-32GTZSK

or something like this is based on similar IC:
https://www.overclockers.com/forums...llistix-Elite-4x16GB-DDR4-3000-BLE16G4D30AEEA

 

[wingman99]

I have had good luck overclocking my G.SKILL 3200 14-14-14-34. In my opinion G.SKILL has the best timings for each kit. Some manufactures don't list all the timings before sale.

 

[Woomack]

G.Skill has the best main timings out of the box. Most brands don't want to risk too tight timings in case if IC will change or in case if next batch will OC worse. G.Skill releases a lot of product numbers, many of them never appear on the market, some are disappearing from the market really fast. One example can be reviewed by me Sniper X 3600 CL19 ... about a week before publishing the article, memory was removed from the product list and replaced with CL20 kit. The same was with 3200 CL13 kits and some others.

Most timings are not listed as SPD/XMP has only couple of timings programmed from a really long list. Even G.Skill is listing only main timings. Actually all manufacturers are listing main timings or maybe SPD/XMP profile and rated voltages. In stores we can often see only CL as many people still think that CL says everything about the timings while it's not true. It simply takes less space and looks better. Brands like Corsair are selling most kits as CL15... 17-17, CL16... 18-18 or 19-19 etc. Only G.Skill decided on releasing some kits at tight timings and higher frequency like 14-14-14 or 15-15-15 but it's clear there is only one type of IC under the heatsinks. When Samsung change IC then we may never see anything like that again ... hard to say but most IC go up with frequency and need more relaxed timings for that.

 

[flitzanu]

thanks for all the input guys, i didn't get notifications that i got further replies. based on the good info i'm just going to save $50 and go with the 3000. i don't know a lot about this stuff anymore, but based on what i was reading it seemed easy enough to get better speed from the 3000 for saving $50 so you've confirmed my suspicions/assumptions. thanks!

 

[caddi daddi]

I have been doing quite a bit of testing of ram the last few weeks and what I have found is that for gaming you want the lowest CL you can get for the speed range of ram you are looking at.
so get the 3000 ram, save a few bucks, set the ram at default xmp and reduce the CL as much as you can.
you won't gain much, 1 percent and less, but you will gain something.