There are no shortage of RAM kits in the marketplace. From a broad selection of speed ratings, to assist in overclocking, to the total amount of RAM you want. There are even RAM kits certified to work perfectly with either an NVIDIA SLI or ATI CrossFire setup. Though multi-card video card configurations can make overclocking difficult, so can a mis-match between the RAM and chipset. So why not produce RAM kits that are certified to work with, and be able to be overclocked on, certain chipsets and CPUs? OCZ seemed to have been wondering the same thing with this AMD Black Edition Ready 4GB DDR3 Kit.
Back in Black
The OCZ DDR3 PC3-12800 AMD Black Edition Ready 4GB Dual Channel Kit is a RAM kit that is certified to work with AMD’s Black Edition multiplier-unlocked CPUs. This means that when paired with such a processor they are guaranteed to meet the specified speed ratings found on the package. In many cases they’ll even exceed what’s specified by a wide margin. Overclocking isn’t the only advantage to this kit, though it’s the basis to the other benefits.
Since the OCZ RAM kit is certified to work with AMD Black Edition CPUs, it’s also designed specifically to work with AMD’s OverDrive software program. Not only that, but they also communicate with the BIOS to increase the frequency and performance of the memory controller. Both AMD and OCZ seem to be positioning this RAM kit as another component to allow you to take full advantage of their Dragon platform.
Features and Specifications
Now all this built in compatibility also allows you to take full advantage of the RAM at its rated speeds and specifications. With that in mind, we should probably list the specifications.
- 1600MHz DDR3
- CL 8-8-8-24 (CAS-TRCD-TRP-TRAS)
- 1.65 Volts
- Available in 4GB D/C kits
- Black Edition Ready XTC
- Lifetime Warranty
- Unbuffered
- 240 Pin DIMM
More specs can be found on the product home page. As for pricing, the CL8 kit we have for review is currently listed at Newegg for $129.99 USD. That is a little steep for a 4GB kit in the grand scheme of things.
Dual channel kits in the 4GB range are going for less then $80 these days. However those are usually value products whose sole purpose is to get 4GB of RAM into your machine. The OCZ kit carries an extra price premium due to it’s additional features. Will they be worth the money? We’ll just have to move forward and find out.
Installation and Testing
Installing RAM is probably the easiest upgrade you can perform on your computer. You largest concern with modern systems is getting the sticks of RAM into the right slots to support the dual or triple channel configuration of your motherboard. Otherwise, you just plug in the sticks and go. For testing we used our standard AMD test rig, with one notable change which I’ll get to in a moment.
- AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition CPU
- Asus M4A79T Deluxe AM3 790FX Motherboard
- Kingston HyperX 4GB DDR3-1600 Dual Channel Memory Kit
- ASUS EAH5850/G/2DIS/1GD5 Radeon HD 5850 Video Card
- Kingston SSDnow V-Series 128GB Solid State Hard Drive
- HighSpeed PC Top Deck Tech Station
- Ultra Products X4 1050W Modular ATX Power Supply
As for testing the RAM itself, we’ve pretty well stuck to benchmarks that are only relevant to RAM speed and performance. Gaming, though important, relies too much on video card performance these days to be able to be used reliably. We’re basically sticking with number crunchers like SiSoftware’s SANDRA package, Everest Pro, and Cinebench R10. We’ll get to those results shortly, but first…
Gotta Turn the Dial to 11 First
Now you don’t need AMD Black Edition certified RAM to use AMD OverDrive to overclock it. However, the certified RAM does support memory profiles with certain motherboards. This means that, with the right hardware, you can simply open up AOD and click on a single button to push your RAM to its advertised specifications. Compare that to the Kingston RAM we normally use, which wouldn’t run at similar specifications on any of our tests boards even though it was rated for similar speeds.
The only caveat is motherboard support. The normal GIGABYTE board we use for testing doesn’t support memory profiles, so I had to switch to the ASUS board. Once the profile was downloaded from the internet and enabled, everything ran as smooth as butter. We even managed to push the RAM we were provided for review to a solid 1776MHz at 8-8-8-20 timings. Not bad at all, considering that’s about 10% beyond it’s rated speed.
SiSoft SANDA is First Up
As you may have guessed the first benchmark we’re rolling out is the synthetic tests performed by SiSoftware’s SANDRA package, specifically the Memory Bandwidth benchmark. Now since the only RAM we had on hand was the Kingston kit, we had to use it for testing, even though it would only putter along at 1333MHz. Even at that speed, you can see that the bandwidth results scale near perfectly with the speed of the RAM.
The percentage of difference between each result near perfectly matches the percentage of difference in speed between the RAM. The big difference here is the ease by which the OCZ kit was overclocked.
Speed Traps on Everest
After taking a look at bandwidth, we move over to Everest to test read, write, and copy speeds of the OCZ AMD Black Edition RAM. Like before we’ll test both stock and overclocked speeds, and pit it against our lower clocked Kingston RAM kit.
The jump in posted results near matches the percentage jump in RAM speed, with only a variance of ±1% overall. The comparison between kits is a little different. Though the OCZ kit was 16.7% faster in acutal clock speed then the Kingston kit, it only managed to post results 14% faster overall. This isn’t a huge enough difference to warrant concern, as the percentage difference won’t be noticeable in day to day use.
Even if you consider that it might mean some loss in performance between the two brands, you have to occupy your thoughts with how little effort was put into overclocking the OCZ kit.
Lights, Camera, Cinebench
Finally we get to take a look at rendering using CineBench R10, and see when a speed increase actually matters in rendering time. During the single core test there was very little variation in the time results. Moving to the multi-core tests managed to mix things up a little. The OCZ kit posted a result 6.6% faster then our Kingston kit, and received a slight 2% bump with the overclock. While this doesn’t compare to the actual percentage difference in speed between the RAM, the minor bump does help.
Final Thoughts and Conclusion
The OCZ DDR3 PC3-12800 AMD Black Edition Ready 4GB dual channel kit is the type of RAM tweakers and enthusiasts are looking for. It operates 100% stable, but most importantly, it gives you the speeds that you paid for out of the box. More impressive is the fact that it is just as stable at higher speeds, and can easily be pushed to said speeds with just a couple of clicks of the mouse using AMD’s Overdrive Software. The software has come a long way and this RAM definitely complements AMD’s efforts.
As with most premium kits, you do pay a premium price, yet the pricing isn’t too far out there. It is just as competitive in price as other kits sporting a unique feature set. This OCZ kit hits the street with prices coming in at about the $130 USD mark, putting it in line with other similarly spec’d RAM kits.
The benefits of this RAM kit are quite clear. Games will load a little quicker, but you might not get massive frames of difference. However, memory intensive operations such as audio and video rendering will receive a speed boost from the added MHz and low latency efficiencies. Even if you aren’t into overclocking it’s nice to have a stable RAM certified to work at the rated speeds that you paid for. Especially if your platform of choice happens to be AMD.
In the end, if you are invested in the AMD platform and want to overclock your Black Edition processor as easy as AMD has been trying to make them to be, it’s hard to deny the appeal of this kit. I would recommend it to any AMD fan resting their performance system on their platform, or someone who wants maximum capability out of their system for minimum effort.
Pros
- 1600MHz rating with low CL8 latency
- AMD OverDrive compatible with Black Edition profile support
- Low profile allows fit under large coolers
- Excellent price
Cons
- Some boards don’t support Black Edition memory profiles
Overall Rating: 9.0/10.0
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OCZ DDR3 PC3-12800 AMD Black Edition Ready 4GB Dual Channel Memory Kit Photo Gallery
