Going For 4GB: DDR2-1066 Kit Round-Up

Power Consumption

This time we decided to look at the power consumption numbers of our test system using the seven different DDR2 memory products. These results were tracked with the specified voltage, default timings, and DDR2-1066 speeds. This means that the Corsair Dominator, OCZ’s Flex II XLS and the Chaintech Apogee GT were operated at clock speeds below their specified maximum, as we wanted to find out the total power consumption of the memory in the first place.

Voltage Matters Most

Obviously, the memory voltage dictates the power consumption for each of the 4 GB DIMM kits. The system idle power ranges from 101.2 W with Crucial’s CT2Kit (1.8 V voltage and CL7 timings) to 107.6 W peak power for Chaintech’s Apogee GT, running at CL5 timings and 2.3 V supply voltage. This represents a 6.3% increase in system power consumption, which does not provide any advantage at all except higher electricity waste. Peak power only increases by almost 4.9%, though.