Holiday Buyer's Guide 2007: Part 1

PDP Patriot Extreme PDC32G1866LLK: RAM For Extreme Overclockers

by Thomas Soderstrom

Why should competitive overclockers limit themselves to DDR2 speeds when today's FSB1333 processors, when tied to the best-overclocking Intel chipsets, require at least DDR2-1000 capable RAM simply to reach an ordinary 50% overclock? DDR3 might only have a small performance benefit over DDR2, but its clock speed advantage cannot be questioned.

The packaging may look a little tame, but the contents are hot, hot, hot!

Enthusiast maker PDP Patriot isn't taking its time in working up to the top of this new market, jumping straight to DDR3-1866 (PC3-15000) with its 2x1 GB dual-channel PDC32G1866LLK kit. Latencies of 8-8-8-24 are typical for any RAM that's expected to go beyond a 1800 MHz data rate, but these seemingly loose timings result in a response time similar to that for DDR2-800 CAS 4. Patriot also plays it a little safer with voltage recommendations, where its 1.90 V setting is slightly lower than the 1.95 or 2.00 V found in a few alternative models.

Patriot Memory is the same firm that won an award for excellent pricing on its low-latency DDR2-800 back in February. While the current crop of DDR3 isn't value-optimized, pricing for enthusiast parts is competitive with similar-speed parts already available from competing manufacturers. All competing brands charge around six times as much for DDR3 as they do for DDR2 at half its speed, as is typical for ultimate-enthusiast market components.

So hey big spender, if you or someone you love is heavily into overclocking, it might be time to treat a much-abused system to some of the fastest RAM on the planet.

  • Mike-TH
    I know this is an old review, I just wanted to warn potential second-hand buyers that the fans in this case are simply crap. If the side panel is left on, my system overheats rapidly. I have seen it get to 80c in a short while when playing WoW. If the panel is left off, it stays under 65c.

    I have a stock i7-920 cpu, GTX-275 graphics and 6gb ram. a velociraptor 300g and 2 WD 2tb 7200rpm drives, along with a DVD-RW drive. Nothing fancy, nothing overclocked, nothing out of the ordinary.

    I bought a box of replacement fans that should help with cooling, once I get off my lazy bum and actually DO the replacing.
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