G.Skill DDR3 PC3-12800 Triple Channel memory review - Introduction

It's quite interesting to see what the release of a new processor architecture can achieve.  If anything the release of Core i7 has shown us that with a standard FSB based and clocked PC, the memory was extremely underappreciated until you started to overclock that front side bus.

With Core i7 things definitely changed. There's much less overhead to deal with, there's plenty of bandwidth for the memory controllers and DDR3 memory finally can be utilized to it's full potential. Ever since our first Core i7 review we where flabbergasted by the bandwidth delivered. Whether you run that memory at 1066, 1333, 1600 or even 1800 MHz is however a big gray area and to seek the true benefit of high frequency low voltage memory which is more expensive opposed to say more regular DDR3 memory at 1333 MHz is a hard thing to seek.

It's therefore not a surprise to see so many memory manufacturers jump on this bandwagon and join the triple channel memory kit caravan.

So that's what we'll do today. We take a 2x3=  6GB  DDR3 memory kit rated at 1600 MHz from the good people at G.Skill. A company that many of you don't even know, yet have been around for over 18-years. G.Skill is expanding into the European and US market though and their presence is becoming larger and more apparent quickly.

G.Skill is also known not to be fighting with the uber-low latency timings based memory, making their product really fast but not enthusiast product. The benefit you'll find back in the sales price though as a comparable memory kit like this typically goes for 330 USD, this one will be selling at 279.99 USD. Of course with the more expensive memory you'd achieve maybe a 2000 MHz clock frequency which the G.skill kit won't do .. but as our tests will show, it wasn't at all afraid of 1866 MHz either though.

This 6 GB kit costs $279.99 right now but they also offer a 3GB kit that runs $149.99, and if you like to take it a notch down, a 1333MHz kit at $109.99. All the kits are timed at 9-9-9-24 and run at 1.5-1.6v, so they have something to offer every segment of the market.

So we'll take that snazzy G.Skill PC3-12800(1600 MHz) memory kit with fairly nice timing and test it through the scope of 800 MHz up-to our overclocked maximum of 1866 MHz in a 64-bit Windows Vista environment.