DDR4-4000 Rumored To Be The New Sweet Spot For AMD Ryzen 5000 CPUs

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Finally a use for high-speed memory.

Ryzen Desktop Processor

Ryzen Desktop Processor (Image credit: AMD)

Turkish news publication Technopat has published an alleged AMD slide that shows that DDR4-4000 is the sweet spot for AMD's upcoming Ryzen 5000-series (codenamed Vemeer) chips. The origin of the slide is unknown, therefore, we recommend you take the information with a pinch of salt.

The last sentence from the slide reads: "DDR4-4000 is to Ryzen 5000 Series as DDR4-3800 was to AMD Ryzen 3000 Series - good luck!". For the record, the statement is inaccurate since AMD suggested that DDR4-3733 is the performance sweet spot for the existing Ryzen 3000-series (codenamed Matisse) processors. To recapitulate, the Ryzen 3000 parts allow synchronous operation between the Infinity Fabric clock (FCLK) and memory clock (MCLK) up to 1,800 MHz or DDR4-3600. Some really good samples can handle 1,900 MHz (DDR4-3800) before breaking the 1:1 ratio. 

If the information is genuine, Ryzen 5000 processors would permit a FCLK up to 2,000 MHz (DDR4-4000). However, it's important to stress that DDR4-3200 is still the official memory speed supported on the Ryzen 5000 processors so it'll still depend on the quality of your chip's integrated memory controller (IMC) that dictates whether you can hit the higher frequencies.

AMD Ryzen 5000 with DDR4-4000 Support (Image credit: Technopat)

Memory vendors will look to cash in on the Ryzen 5000 processors. Assuming that the improved memory support is accurate, the new Zen 3 processors will surely bolster DDR4-4000 sales. However, it remains to be seen whether they will take advantage of what these memory kits have to offer since going up the frequency ladder typically means sloppy timings.

If we look on the current market, the Patriot Viper 4 Blackout DDR4 16GB (2x8GB), which retails for $84.99, is the cheapest DDR4-4000 memory kit in the 16GB category. The timings aren't as impressive as the frequency though. The memory kit has its timings configured at 19-21-21-41. However, there are some pretty decent DDR4-4000 offerings on the market, but they carry a heavy premium. For example, the G.Skill Ripjaws V DDR4-4000 16GB (2x8GB) boasts timings of 15-16-16-36, but presently retails for $159.99.

AMD will unlock the floodgates for Zen 3 on November 5. There's already word around town that the Ryzen 5000-series processors will land with substantial instructions per cycle (IPC) improvements. Better memory overclocking capability would certainly be the icing on the cake.

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Zhiye Liu
Zhiye Liu
News Editor and Memory Reviewer

Zhiye Liu is a news editor and memory reviewer at Tom’s Hardware. Although he loves everything that’s hardware, he has a soft spot for CPUs, GPUs, and RAM.

54 Comments Comment from the forums
  • nofanneeded
    What will happen if the Memory clocks are higher than the CPU clocks? no speed gain I suppose over the CPU clocks right?
    Reply
  • ScrewySqrl
    wll, teh sweet spot for Ryzen 3xxx was 3733 CAS 17. 4000 CAS 19 for Ryzen 5000 might not be far off from it
    Reply
  • Solidjake
    Then 4000 for the Ryzen 6000 ;)
    Reply
  • hannibal
    This is old rumour that seems to surface again and again...
    The memory controller is exactly the same as with 3000 series, so the ram speed has not been chanced. Aka 3600 is the sweet spot. 3733 if you Are lucky.
    Reply
  • Syntextoxy
    I highly doubt it, I think I was watching either Jaystwocents or gamers nexus about the reveal, and the comparisons amd made to Nvidia and Intel, they asked amd about the systems they used and were told they used the same systems and mentioned 3600mhz. And during a reveal they're sure to use all the sweet spots they can to get better results for the reveal. So I think 3600 mhz is still gonna be the same sweet spot as with the 3000 cpus.
    Reply
  • cryoburner
    DDR4-4000 is to Ryzen 5000 Series as DDR4-3800 was to AMD Ryzen 3000 Series - good luck!
    That sounds less like the "sweet spot" and more like the limit. I would argue that the "sweet spot" is the point where going faster doesn't make much sense from a price to performance standpoint.

    DDR4-3600 generally doesn't cost much more than 10% or so more than a comparable kit of DDR4-3200. The CPU performance gains it brings typically amount to no more than a few percent at best, but that can be considered worth an extra $5-$10 or so.

    For DDR4-4000 though (or really any speed faster than 3600), the price climbs much more, generally being close to twice as much as a comparable kit of DDR4-3600. Even if you are looking to gain maybe a few percent more performance at some tasks, now you're paying substantially more for that mostly imperceptible performance bump. For the vast majority of people, that's not going to be worth the premium.

    So, DDR4-3600 will likely continue to be the "sweet spot" for Ryzen 5000, at least unless we see a substantial price drop for the higher speeds at some point.
    Reply
  • hotaru.hino
    nofanneeded said:
    What will happen if the Memory clocks are higher than the CPU clocks? no speed gain I suppose over the CPU clocks right?
    The memory clock speed is still 2000MHz in this case. 4000 is just the transfer rate.

    Either way, it depends on if the CPU can use the extra bandwidth or not.
    Reply
  • ajr1775
    Just stick to the tried and true 3600 memory with good timings. Going to 4000 with looser timings 'aint going to gain you much of anything.
    Reply
  • daworstplaya
    Solidjake said:
    Then 4000 for the Ryzen 6000 ;)

    Zen4 / Ryzen 6000 will use DDR5.
    I can see this being possible now since the Infinity fabric doesn't need to talk between 2 CCXs any more for a 8 Core Zen3 part (Eg: 3800x). Now there is only 1 CCX for an 8 core part, so they could possibly bump up the Infinity fabric speed a little before having to switch to 2:1 mode. DDR 4000 sounds very plausible if they have optimized the layout of the architecture on the chip lowering heat towards the memory controller. DDR4000 with tight timings could be worth a bit. Exciting times.
    Reply
  • torbjorn.lindgren
    hannibal said:
    This is old rumour that seems to surface again and again...
    The memory controller is exactly the same as with 3000 series, so the ram speed has not been chanced. Aka 3600 is the sweet spot. 3733 if you Are lucky.
    Yes, the IO chiplet that contains the memory controllers has not changed but... that's usually NOT the limiting factor on Ryzen.
    The limiting factor on this interconnect clock is likely the traces on the interposer going between the cpu chiplet(s) and the IO chiplet.
    So it might be possible to clock it higher despite not changing the IO chiplet if AMD use better material in the interposer or it might even just be a case of needing to tweak the trace layout on the interposer to improve signal integrity - this is similar to how newer AM4 motherboards tends to be able to clock the same memory much higher than say B350 motherboards even in cases where they're tested using exactly the same CPU and the BIOS'es uses the exactly same AGESA version (the code from AMD included in the BIOS that sets up a lot of basic parameters including base setup of the memory controller).
    This article had no place on Tom's in the first place, this is Wccftech-grade random rumor, Tom's supposed to be better than that!
    Reply