Kingston HyperX 1.35v LoVo 1,600MHz RAM - MiniReview

[Humanoid1]

And DAMN, I Love having my new RAM - just bought 16GB Kingston HyperX LoVo 1600MHz 1.35v in two sets of 2x 4GB
(KHX1600C9D3LK2/8GX)

I was running on only 3x 1GB Corsair Dominator 8-8-8-24
and Really struggling with Page File thrashing on the 2nd HDD

I came across Dataram's RAMDisk personal versin is free as long as you do not need to make a RAMDisk of over 4GB and seems very reliable & fast so far.
I set up a 4GB RAMDisk for the pagefile & now all my HDD's are barely ever running - a real life saver


Being on a tight budget can waste a lot of time picking the Right hardware for the money lol
and the good gear is So Overpriced in the UK -.-

INTRO to this Experience:

Ended up looking at the low voltage stuff hoping it would OC well from having used better chips than normal + seeing the odd good review by chance
So, cutting the story short:

Saw the G.Skill Sniper 1600MHz 1.25v set do well in a review or two - but Most reviews (site and user) came up pretty mixed leaning on the negative side of things

Saw the Samsung Green MV-3V4G3D/US - is a super low profile 1.25v 1600MHz 2x 4GB using the latest Samsung 30nm chips. I hear nothing but Good stuff about this set
But... only Very few UK suppliers and they are price hicking like Crazy ($46.99 in US and has worked its way up in price to the "Sale Special Offer" of $75.98 now lol

About now I was starting to get Really bored of searching through reviews and struggling (PageFile thrashing all the time on my 2nd HDD) on with my poor 3x 1GB Corsair Dominator 8-8-8-24 set (I mean, look how long this post is getting and I'm trying to keep it short)

Then saw some Good things on many sites about the great looking Kingston HyperX LoVo 1.35v 1600MHz 2x 4GB kits

They seemed capable of miracles, Super Tight timings and or High speeds!!!
One guy managed 1908MHz @ 7-7-7-20timings with 1.65v
Sadly this was on the now discontinued 1866MHz LoVo model using the excellent "Elpida Hyper" chips

The Right RAM & Some Testing

The current 1600MHz Green sets are still shipping in the old (clasps at top) as well as the new style (holes along top) :

(you get the idea)

I have to say this is some nice looking memory + Easily fits under my Noctua NH-D14's heatsink which was partly a factor in my choice of this RAM

After much digging I found the newer Genesis model of the 1600MHz LoVo RAM uses the 30nm Micron D9PFJ (DA-125) chips. Sadly these do not hold quite such tight timings as the older Elpida Hyper ones, but they are Quite happy to go for high speeds on slightly relaxed timings and run cooler.

One thing I Must say surprised me when testing was How variable each stick was in its capabilities!!! For example out of the 4 sticks I bought, testing at 2,000MHz 9-9-9-27 one stick at a time (all testing was done @ 1T of course):

1 = Passed All tests @ 1.6v - (did not like tighter timings or 1.5v)
2 = Could benchmark, but failed Prime95
3 = Sometimes could load Windows @ 1.64v
4 = Lucky to see Login Screen@ 1.64v

After too Many hours of testing (Damn but I need an SSD for this **** lol) late last night I had the Best 3 sticks all running Almost prime95 stable @ 2,000MHz 9-10-9-27 with 1.60v before I backed down to my tested and stable 1,600MHz 8-9-8-24 with 1.5v for the night and some folding. Not all the sticks were happy with 8-8-8-24 but that 9 seemed to make things sweet

And Some Interesting Benchmarks

Initially as you can imagine I did not want to side grade to more RAM but with lower timings at same speed and was feeling a little sad I could not get the 8-8-8-24 timings I had run on my old RAM...
But having done a little benchmarking, to which I might add some more later, showed up some surprising results.

In most reviews I have read on this stuff people running same speed+timings tests have shown this RAM to have a slight advantage over others tested.

Below are a few SiSoftware Sandra Benchmarks with the old and new RAM:

Corsair Dominator 1,600MHz 8-8-8-24 1.64v
Aggregate Memory Performance : 21.485GB/s (Ranked 18,303 - Higher than 90.44% results)
Memory Latency : 21.7ns (Ranked 2,154 - Higher than 82.75% results)

Kingston HyperX LoVo 3x 4GB 1,600MHz 9-9-9-27 1.4v
Aggregate Memory Performance : 24.622GB/s (Ranked 11,921 - Higher than 93.78% results)
Memory Latency : 22.5ns (Ranked 2,747 - Higher than 78.09% results)

Kingston HyperX LoVo 3x 4GB 1,600MHz 8-9-8-21 1.5v
Aggregate Memory Performance : 25.087GB/s (Ranked 10,968 - Higher than 94.28% results)
Memory Latency : 22.0ns (Ranked 2,390 - Higher than 80.94% results)

Kingston HyperX LoVo 3x 4GB 2,000MHz 9-10-9-27 1.60v
(not Prime95 Stable – need to tweak some more…)
Aggregate Memory Performance : 27.618GB/s (Ranked 6,497 - Higher than 96.61% results)
Memory Latency : 20.2ns (Ranked 1,122 - Higher than 91.03% results)

The increase in bandwidth by 3.137GB/s at only 9-9-9-27 compared to the Corairs 8-8-8-24 both running 1,600MHz was a nice find

FarCry 2 is a game I have seen responds quite well to increases like this in reviews I read. Going from Corsair Dominator 8-8-8-24 1,600MHz to Patriot Viper II it gained 3 - 5 fps. This Kingston I know beats out the Patriot memory, so all in all this leaves me Pretty Happy with this new RAM running with 1,600MHz 8-9-8-21. Running only 1.5v and saving a little power over a year cannot hurt either, something I would loose out on running the higher speeds which seem to want volts

Later when my patience returns I will play more with some 2,000MHz speeds and getting them rock solid.

Is good to know that having some Good RAM working with nice settings can make a noticeable real world difference beyond that of just benchmarks.
I know I would feel the extra smoothness an extra 5fps could bring me in games on my system. Until I upgrade the GFz card to the latest monster I need all the extra I can get ^^

My motherboard lets me run 4 sticks in Tri channel mode with 2 sticks occupying the 1st bank, but I was having trouble getting them to run 1T like this, but have done limited testing so far. Something else I will explore the possibilities of later - though will mean adding the weakest stick out of my set of 4...

Well thanks for reading and hope it was a help to some of you


Main Parts System when I wrote this up:
Gigabyte X58A-OC
Xeon X5650 @ 3.6GHz 1.15v(idle28c folding58c)
Noctua NH-D14 (140mm fan only @ 1.1k rpm)
3x 4GB Kingston HyperX LoVo 1,600MHz 8-9-8-21 1T @ 1.5v
Asus 5850
Seasonic S12 500W (SS-500HT Active PFC F3)

Linky to a Google translated version of a nice to the point review I found on the same stuff!

 

[kmo_9000]

Very interesting. I can see how you would be having problems on only 3gb ram. I have 4 right now because I am rma'ing my g-skill 16gb kit and playing bf3 my system has a 9gb commit charge.

I actually ordered some of that Samsung 1.35v ram (typo on your part?) and I plan to tighten the timings and maybe overclock it a bit. On Newegg.ca it was 46.99 when I ordered it earlier this week, I checked it just now and it seems to be 44$ now.

 

[Humanoid1]

Heya,

Yeah, I am one of those guys who likes 8 FireFox windows open at a time each with a dozen tabs open, other usual apps and folding@home in the background too

Feels so Easy now, certainly glad I bought the RAM before the SSD. Like this I am less sure I would want to spend the money on an SSD - but I will of course, just might get a newer GFx card 1st and earlier than planned

You are right, that is listed as a 1.35v+ part officially.
I checked the 1.25v stat from www.overclockers.co.uk who normally list official stats on their product pages.

But I think have some kind of "link-in" going on with www.kitguru.net who give OC.uk a good heads up at the end of their review I just now have seen. OC.uk seem to pull their product stats for This particular product from the 1st page of their review. Something I have never been aware of them doing before

OC.uk are actually the company I was quietly mentioning in my minireview who were busy price hiking on this product -currently on Weekly Special Offer sale at Only $75.98 "reduced" from $98.18 lol
I know a time back they were selling this as a regular(I think it was a non sale price) price of $61.86

I am not a fan of companies price hiking
Years back when ATI released the 5850 for a Fair RRP price and they were in high demand, OC.uk were one of the 1st UK companies I was aware of to whack a Load of extra "demand charges" on, I think they roughly added $111 over RRP -.-

That hurt a bit as they are trying to foster a community behind their online store...

Anyways, Sorry for getting sidetracked there, guess I too would have liked to have bought this great product from them

 

[kmo_9000]

Regardless, it was a great read. I can't wait to get 16gb again. I won't let anyone tell me you only need 8gb of ram anymore.

As far as the price hiking thing, I generally use price checking websites such as http://pcpartpicker.com/ which lists the cheapest price of all components. It works for the US, Canada, the UK and a couple other sites. You should check it out (if you haven't heard of it already) next time you're looking for any computer related hardware.

 

[Humanoid1]

Very kind of you to say so, Thanks <3

I came across that pcpartpicker site on my searches for good deals on this memory also. Seems a great site, but perhaps is still new and needs more members adding links as was missing a few of the better deals when I visited on the items I happened to check.

Saved a link and might have a closer look later too.

Yup, is my 1st time having over 5GB working in one system now and loving it. I've not maxed out my memory capacity usage yet, but already considering more could be fun to have. Could maybe play with bigger RAM Drives for stuff, like maybe DVD/Blueray backup-ripping + encoding might benefit. Am sure more ideas will come to mind ^^
Definitely going to experiment with virtual machines more soon too...


I saw the other day one of the upcoming game's Recommended System Req's asks for 8GB RAM lol
12GB is going to start feeling like just enough to be above Recommended, times are a changing as fast as ever, a good thing perhaps

 

[kmo_9000]

If you have 16gb or more of memory, another program that is good to have is ImDisk. It's a free ramdisk program that allows you to mount ISO's to the ram (which is way better than deamon tools) and create ramdisks to install games too or to use as a really fast drive.

Best ram disk program I've ever used.

Go here, scroll down and get the install package.

 

[Reefa_Madness]

After much digging I found the newer Genesis model of the 1600MHz LoVo RAM uses the 30nm Micron D9PFJ (DA-125) chips. Sadly these do not hold quite such tight timings as the older Elpida Hyper ones, but they are Quite happy to go for high speeds on slightly relaxed timings and run cooler.

One thing I Must say surprised me when testing was How variable each stick was in its capabilities!!! For example out of the 4 sticks I bought, testing at 2,000MHz 9-9-9-27 one stick at a time (all testing was done @ 1T of course):

1 = Passed All tests @ 1.6v - (did not like tighter timings or 1.5v)
2 = Could benchmark, but failed Prime95
3 = Sometimes could load Windows @ 1.64v
4 = Lucky to see Login Screen@ 1.64v

After too Many hours of testing (Damn but I need an SSD for this **** lol) late last night I had the Best 3 sticks all running Almost prime95 stable @ 2,000MHz 9-10-9-27 with 1.60v before I backed down to my tested and stable 1,600MHz 8-9-8-24 with 1.5v for the night and some folding. Not all the sticks were happy with 8-8-8-24 but that 9 seemed to make things sweet

Just an FYI, some of those Kingston LoVo have been known to use Hynix CFR chips, instead of the Micron. It is possible that you have a kit of each. Hopefully you don't have a kit with a module of each.

See post #14 in this thread.

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums...-KHX2800-C12&p=5110413&highlight=#post5110413

 

[Humanoid1]

and so it does! Thanks for the info.

My local supplier seems to have a pretty fast turnaround on this RAM so should be from the same newer batch
(that thread is about 3 years old now so I imagine I am on sets of the newer 30nm Micron D9PFJ, which ties to my experiences of it liking high speed, but not tight timings)
But two of the sticks were definitely inferior performers... was not keeping an eye on if they came from the same pack though.

and thanks kmo_9000 for the link about ImDisk. If I can get that 4th stick of RAM working in Tri Channel 1T I will try that out, but for now I am happy with RAMDisks 4GB limit + is meant to be faster than ImDisk (though does not have the configurability features of ImDisk I believe)

 

[kmo_9000]

Thought I would post the results I got with my Samsung Green MV-3V4G3D/US ram.

I managed to get them running at 1600mhz 8-8-8-24-1T in quad channel (4 sticks =16gb) @ 1.410v. So I'm pretty impressed with them so far.

I ran memtest86 for about 10 min or so, then played BF3 and Diablo 3 for the rest of the night. Still haven't had a chance to test it with benchmarks, but so far it looks completely stable.

 

[Humanoid1]

sounds good.

I get the feeling that RAM might be able to cope with something like 7-7-7-21 1T
or perhaps even tighter + tighter timings bring about almost equal performance gains as MHz with RAM ofc

From what I have seen tighter timings do not need lots of volts like higher speeds do, so can still save a little power, over several years of running a machine (especially if 24/7 like me) really starts to add up!

for me 100watts = £9.50 per month (USD $15.24)

I know Lo Voltage RAM only saves about 2 to 5+ watts per stick, but assuming 3watts and 4 sticks over 2 years = £27.36 ($43.80)

So even on items with low wattage savings, it does become a significant purchase decision. Let alone on bigger items like GFx cards. I held off buying a cheap 2nd hand 480GTX recently once I realised buying a more costly modern card with similar performance would save me £156 ($250) in power bills over a couple of years lol

Well, have fun with your RAM, is Probably the Best 4GB a stick RAM available atm

 

[kmo_9000]

I'm sure I could tweek it more if I spent some more time. I tried 7-8-8-24-1T @ 1.395v, and 8-8-8-24-1T @ 1.395v, upping 1.410v seems to be the sweet spot for 1600mhz at these timings. I'm sure with a bit more voltage I can get them down even more.

But considering most DDR3 CAS 8 retail kits are min 1.5v (and cost a lot more than the 46$ I paid), I'm really impressed with this ram. It's not so much about energy saving for me. But it does give you a little piece of mind having the ram running at such a low voltage. I mean it must be better for both the ram and the system overall by causing less stress and such.

 

[Humanoid1]

yeah, I think you are right. I read somewhere that running lo voltage RAM reduces CPU temps too due to how things are so tied in together now

I would be pretty happy with what you achieved also, a step up from what mine managed as it is

Having attained something good like that, can seem a waste of time for a Little from here - unless trying for the best benchmark results there is little point, except fun, for most of us to try for the bleeding edge of what we can squeeze out of out kit.

Though I am for Sure going to try and get my CPU to over 4GHz when I have a few more moments to spare
(These X58 chipsets have a Lot of interconnected variables governing stability, already wasted so much time - think I will this next time safe max them All and see what happens - Then start backing them off ^^ )

 

[Humanoid1]

sorry Reefa_Madness, that was a really recent thread you linked...

Got caught out by seeing the packaging they used from Way back + miss read a "Joined Date" as a posted date
They do not use that Green Robot packaging here in the UK from what I can tell now.

Well, won't know unless I strip a stick or two down now I guess... not sure I am up for that yet or how easy that is to put back right after