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There's not much to say about the unboxing experience, here. The kit here today is packed like any other memory kit ever, though a shoutout must go to Crucial for how they pack their high end 'Ballistix Elite' modules, which come in a fold out soft-touch box. Anyway, seeing as a premium experience when unboxing RAM isn't expected, I'll say nothing more. Included in the blister is, however, a nice little sticker which you can slap onto your tower. It actually looks good, in my opinion, and unlike having an Intel/AMD sticker on your rig, at least nobody can accuse you of fanboy status?
On the back of the box, we can see that compatibility with Asus' Aura Sync touted. Aura does seem to be the software that most 3rd party vendors seem to be going for, in terms of making their RGB products play nicely.
I may have said earlier that 'Understated' was a subjective term, and - yes - the looks of something always going to be a little bit subjective. However, speaking as someone who really couldn't care less about RGB (reading my previous reviews will give you an idea of this), I really think that this kit looks utterly fantastic. Without the TUF branding, in gold, it might run the risk of looking a little boring. However, I really appreciate the highlights that the gold accents give the kit. It all works wonderfully well, with the matte black heatspreader and gold highlights really coming together to make - in my mind - a very smart bit of kit. Naturally, this is with the product sans electricity, so my mind might change once we light her up. That said, I really don't think it will. Whilst product photos from source are always to be treated with some grains of salt, there is only so much photoshop can do, and I do already like the way the RGB is supposedly done.
Just like the Apacer review done back in August, Team Group has glued the heatspreader to the PCB/substrate, meaning no removal of the heatspreader today. Naturally, we always recommend sticking to the pre-configured XMP/DOCP memory profiles, but we will - of course - be doing some manual tweaking later on.
Height wise, we're looking at 49mm with the heatspreader. This is certainly on the taller side of things, and you should check compatibility if you are using a larger or dual-tower air cooler, as these have a tendency to overhang memory slots on mainstream/HEDT motherboards. Immediately, coolers like Noctua's NH-D15, BeQuiet's Dark Rock Pro 4, and Cryorig's R1 Ultimate, will require shorter memory modules. In fact, I'm going to go out on a limb and say 'use an AIO' or find a cooler that doesn't overhang at least the first DIMM slot. Certainly, however, if you are looking to use a large dual-tower air cooler, or even a larger single tower model, please check this RAM will fit, as I suspect you'll be out of luck come build or assembly day. That said, given the overwhelming popularity of AIO's in the custom built PC market, I don't foresee this as much of an issue. Yes, I know that high-end air coolers are just as capable as some 240 or even 280mm AIOs, but the fact remains that - for the most part - an AIO is usually more desirable from a visual standpoint, and installing them into PCs is generally regarded as significantly easier.
