MSI Gaming Overclocking Team member Kovan Yang has managed to coax a stick of DDR5 to achieve DDR5-10004. In a system packing an Intel Core i9-12900KS, fixed to an MSI MEG Z690 Unify-X motherboard, Yang pushed a single 16GB stick of Kingston Fury Beast DDR5 RAM to 5,001.8 MHz (10,004 MT/s, DDR5-10004). Perhaps surprisingly, Kingston Fury Beast DDR5 isn't a top pick in our Best DDR5 RAM benchmarks hierarchy.
The MSI OC Team DDR5 overclocking achievement is significant, as it is the first to poke its nose over the 5,000 MHz / DDR5-10000 threshold. For reference, the second place DDR5 frequency record holder is Lupin_no_musume with 4779.7 MHz, followed by Safedisk with 4,756.6 MHz, and Hicookie with 4,501.6 MHz, with the rest of the top 10 floundering below.
The HWBot overclocking submission page shares some of the details of the technique used by Yang to achieve this world record DDR5 overclock. For these kinds of record attempts it seems like the current best practice is to use a single stick of 16GB DDR5 RAM. This DDR5-10004 achievement relied on Kingston Fury Beast DDR5.
The overclocking details suggest the CPU was liquid nitrogen cooled, but there is no specific cooling method specified for the RAM. As other top 10 entrants sometimes note that LN2 is used to cool the RAM, it is quite certain this is the case with Kovan Yang's submission too - given the extreme speeds involved.
Elsewhere it is notable that MSI's overclocker has downclocked the CPU to just 425 MHz. Other charting overclockers in this category have quite slow running CPUs, but we noticed second placed Lupin_no_musume had overclocked their 12900K by 10%.
MSI seems to be rather proud of this achievement by their in-house overclocking team member. The motherboard at the heart of the record breaking system was the MSI MEG Z690 Unify-X. The MEG Z690 Unify range is claimed to embody stealthy looks with ultimate performance. We have recently shared in-depth reviews of the $489 MSI MEG Z690 Unify (ATX), as well as the diminutive $399 MSI MEG Z690I Unify (ITX), but not had the Unify-X through the labs as yet.
Other key components in Kovan Yang's rig that we have had in for review include the Intel Core i9-12900KS, which was released less than a month ago. And we had a very close look at a Kingston Fury Beast DDR5-5200 C40 memory kit, but our sample wasn't very receptive to our overclocking attempts. Needless to say, MSI's overclocking team will have had the chance to cherry-pick some of the best components for their overclocking fun and frolics.
