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G.Skill 2x2GB PC2 6400 (F2-6400CL4D-4GBPI-B)


Date
: 12/6/08 – 03:31:24 AM

Author
:

Category
: Memory

Page 1 : Index

Manufacturer:
G.Skill

It wasn't long ago that we first welcomed G.Skill to Overclockers Online and this month they return again.

G.Skill recently launched their PI series and they have continued that series with the Black version. Much like the F2-8800CL5D-4GBPI kit reviewed earlier, the F2-6400CL4D-4GBPI-B kit brings low latency along with low voltage. Read on to find out exactly what this kit has going for it.

Page 2 : Package and Contents

We'll start off with the package and then move inside.

Packaging is nearly identical to the G.Skill PC2 PI 8800 I reviewed earlier. The only real difference is that the color is black. The front still prominently displays the symbol for Pi with the motto for the PI series below that.

The back of the packaging continues the similarities where it contains the product name and company information.

The front flap opens up with graphics showing thermal readings with the heatspreaders. There is also a window displaying the memory contained inside.

The modules are packaged inside a plastic shell within the cardboard outer packaging.

Included with the memory is a G.Skill case badge and sticker.

Again, like we saw earlier the heatspreaders are identical to the PI PC2 8800 reviewed earlier except in black. I rather like the black look over the silver of the aforementioned kit.

And to just touch on the heatspreaders again, they have a sort of crisscrossed pattern that allows for a greater movement of air for better cooling.

Page 3 : Features and Specifications

For specifications and features I grabbed them straight from G.Skill's site here.

As started by their original PI series kits, the Black series also utilizes 1.8V to 1.9V so no worries about the motherboard not being able to supply enough voltage initially. The biggest change for the PI Black series is tighter timings.

After carefully prying off the heatspreader, oddly I found there is no sort of markings on the memory modules at all.

Page 4 : Installation

Since the heatspreaders are a bit tall, this is the main concern with installation since it may interfere with some CPU coolers.

Obviously they won't pose any problems with stock coolers, but could with larger heatsinks.

G.Skill includes 3 JEDEC profiles from 200MHz to 400MHz along with the EPP profile for 400MHz with the tighter timings.

Page 5 : Test Setup and Overclocking

Below are the system specifications that will be used for testing.

• CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo E8400

• MB: Gigabyte P35-DS3R
• GPU: Biostar 9600GT
• PSU: Ultra X3 1000W
• HD: Western Digital 250GB SATA
• DVD-Rom: LiteOn 18x DVD Burner SATA
• Case: CoolerMaster HAF 932

First off I'll dig in and see what kind of overclocking can be achieved with this set. Since the primary feature of this kit is the low timings at low volts, I'm going to focus my efforts to se how far we can get with this kit at these stock timings of 4-4-4-12. To test stability what has been pretty reliable for me has been as follows:

• Orthos (Large, in-place FFTs)

• Multiple runs of 3DMark06 (3 looped runs)
• Dual runs of SuperPi 32M (using HyperPi 0.99b)

While testing I was able to maintain the 1.9V for speeds up to 445MHz but had to bump it up to 2.0V to reach 460MHz. This seems to be the wall for stock timings as bumping the voltage up to even 2.2V would not budge the memory up any more at these timings. Even at 2.0V this is pretty good timings to have.

Next I ran the memory through some benchmarks at both stock and overclock settings. Here are the details for the memory settings:

To try and keep things even on the CPU front, I used a 7x multi for overclocked (3.22GHz) and an 8x multi for stock settings (3.2GHz).

Also for comparison, I included results for the G.Skill F2-8800CL5D using the following settings.

G.Skill F2-8800CL5D

1100, 5-5-5-15, 459×7 with 5:6 divider

Page 6 : Memory Benchmarks

I'm going to start out with some memory bandwidth benchmarks.

Memory Bandwidth – Lavalys Everest Ultimate

Memory Bandwidth – Sisoft Sandra XII.SP2c

Memory Bandwidth – SciencMark 2.0

Results are pretty much what I would expect aside from the Everest results. The results for the copy portion seem somewhat out of whack. ScienceMark and Sandra scores are about where I would expect them to be. We can definitely see the advantages of the lower timings.

Memory Latency

We basically see the same results in latency numbers as we did in the bandwidth numbers.

Page 7 : System Benchmarks

Now we will move onto some more system wide benchmarks.

Futuremark PCMark05

Similar to the bandwidth testing, the overclocked PI Black kit comes close to matching the higher clocked with higher timings G.Skill F2-8800CL5D kit.

SuperPI

Once again a pretty common theme as results still play out in the same order. Tighter timings can make up a decent amount of ground in synthetic benchmarks.

Page 8 : 3D and Gaming Benchmarks

To finish things up I'm going to run through some gaming oriented benchmarks, since a lot of times it is games that we buy this hardware for.

Futuremark's 3DMark03, 3DMark05 and 3DMark06

While the 3DMark series is a standard for benchmarks, it really doesn't respond well to changes in memory timings or bandwidth numbers so numbers are fairly even across the board.

Crysis, Half Life 2: Lost Coast and Company of Heroes

The gaming benchmarks seem to paint a slightly different picture. The PI Black PC6400 kit outperforms the higher clocked PI PC8800 in Crysis and Company of Heroes.

Page 9 : Conclusion

With the relatively slow adoption of DDR3 it's nice to see great DDR2 kits still being released. G.Skill has a great line of memory with the PI series and they have improved even further with the Black editions. The Black edition brings latency timings down even further while still retaining the low power requirements making these an ideal memory upgrade for those with a limited FSB CPU or motherboard.

While I was only able to reach 460FSB with the F2-6400CL4D-4GBPI-B kit at the stock timings, raising the timings would defeat the purpose of this kit of memory but would likely yield higher speeds.

Positives

• Low latency

• Low voltage
• Black heatspreaders

Negatives

• Tall heatspreaders may interfere

Overclockers Online would like to thank G.Skill for supplying the F2-6400CL4D-4GBPI-B for review.