Crucial Ballistix Memory Stability Testing and Review
Special thanks to Kelly at
Crucial Memory for providing
these test samples for review and testing in Gigabyte boards.
Crucial was kind enough to offer these samples so that I may offer the best support to our many Crucial users with first hand knowledge of the ram itself.
This is test results and findings on two specific models of Crucial Memory. I am providing several sets of timings and voltages at various speeds for Gigabyte P35 and P45 based boards at the end of this article.
Crucial has been a long time provider and manufacturer of Computer Dram Modules and Ram based products. Crucial is a Part of the Lexar Media Family of products and is owned by Micron Technology. They manufacture high-quality products in several memory based categories which include USB flash drives, all popular form factors of memory cards and card readers, and DRAM computer memory for PC and Mac systems. They also manufacture solid state drives (SSD) which are now becoming more and more popular and more accessible to the general public with prices coming down recently.
Crucial has received many awards for various products which you may view here and follow links to the full reviews and awards >>
Crucial’s Awards
Quote:
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Originally Posted by Crucial.com
What is Ballistix memory?
The Ballistix line is specifically built for performance enthusiasts who want to push the performance envelope without worrying about data loss or corruption, mysterious intermittent errors and display problems, or worse — the dreaded BSOD! The Ballistix line of high-performance memory modules features advanced speed grades, low latencies, and integrated aluminum heat spreaders.
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The kits described here are Crucial’s new Ballistix kits and are rated at PC2-6400 @ 2.0V
The modules are as follows:
1GB Module (4x1GB in testing)
1GB, Ballistix 240-pin DIMM, DDR2 PC2-6400 memory module
Module Size: 1GB
Package: Ballistix 240-pin DIMM
Feature: DDR2 PC2-6400
Specs: DDR2 PC2-6400 • 4-4-4-12 • Unbuffered • NON-ECC • DDR2-800 • 2.0V • 128Meg x 64
2GB Module (2x2GB in testing)
2GB, Ballistix 240-pin DIMM, DDR2 PC2-6400 memory module
Module Size: 2GB
Package: Ballistix 240-pin DIMM
Feature: DDR2 PC2-6400
Specs: DDR2 PC2-6400 • 4-4-4-12 • Unbuffered • NON-ECC • DDR2-800 • 2.0V • 256Meg x 64
Tests were performed for each of the following settings in these boards: Two P35 boards and one P45 board. Each passed 12 hours or more of
Memtest86+ 2.11, and each passed several hours of
HCI Design’s Memtest running dual tests within windows while the system was in use. Along with that, each setting range was thoroughly put through various benchmark programs and tests, some of which will be graphed below. The graphed results were obtained in my main system, a GA-EP45-DS4P.
You may rest assured each of the tables of settings that are provided below will be fully stable for you on the memory side of things. If you have any issues, they would likely be due to other various non- memory related settings. The settings provided are for starting stability, and not fully tweaked. The reason I requested this memory was to help user s with stability issues, so please start there.
Benchmark results are provided at three common speed ranges: 800, 900, and 1000. The 800 and 1000 speeds are programmed into the SPD of each module. For simplicity in helping others most all of these benchmarks and settings provided will be using the 2.00B or 2.00D (1:1) MCH/NB Strap. These results are solely based on the stable settings provided for initial stability, not tweaked at all. They can however be tweaked to better then I have posted here, and by no means is the settings provided all that this Crucial Memory will do.
Testing Setup:
Gigabyte P35-DS4, P35-DQ6, EP45-DS4P
Intel Xeon E3110 3.0Ghz
Crucial DDR2 PC2-6400 Ram (4x1GB, 2x2GB)
Sapphire HD3870 Toxic 512MB GDDR4
750W PSU (Don't ask
)
OS: Vista Ultimate SP1 x64
4x1GB Benchmarks
2x2GB Benchmarks
Super PI Benchmarks (Both sets of memory)
