EVEN AS INTEL announced its new-generation DDR3-optimised mainstream P45 and G45 chipsets - finally - the memory itself hasn't yet become mainstream in its pricing. While some vendors like Kingston and Corsair will emphasise their 'value' DDR3 module price-to-performance ratio, the overall focus is still on that second feature - performance.

And, oh yes, add capacity to it. As we mentioned before, high capacity DDR3 modules in 2 x 2GB kits would have reached DDR3-2000 speeds, as Corsair and OCZ already offer by now. Take a look at some of the interesting offerings here - a comparison between Corsair 4GB DDR3-2000 CL9 kit on an Asus Striker II Extreme mobo mentioned earlier by Charlie and zoomed in this time, vs, say, OCZ's water-cooled DDR3-2000 kit:

And, not to forget, our favourite hard-core gamer John "Fatal1ty" was there at the OCZ booth promoting their new mainstream "Fatal1ty" branded memory - and no, obviously this is not Jonathan, but the lovely Jessica from OCZ holding it.

Talking about OCZ, ever wondered how their memory water cooling works when those DIMM tubes are oh so much thinner than the big fat usual 3/8-inch tubing? As you can see on the photo above, here's the answer - split first, then come back together. And yes, yet another Asus mobo, this time an X48, on a memory ve ndors' booth - more than just coincidence?

Something very interesting at the Gskill place: ever wanted 16GB RAM in your PC, I mean on the usual four-slot single-CPU mainboard? Here's something for both Intel and AMD owners to cheer about then: a 4 x 4GB DDR2 DIMM kit giving you that much RAM! Shurely enuff even for the next Windoze 7 to boot, at least? Or to run memory-intensive workstation stuff on your desktop? However, do make sure that your mobo can address that much... and don't be upset with its CL6-6-6 latency!

Other vendors, like Geil, Team, the big A-Data and so on were also offering a variety of high-speed and/or high-capacity DDR2 and DDR3 modules: we'll bring you a comparison of some offerings on real X48 and 790i mainboards real soon now. µ