OCZ DDR2 800 gamer memory has nice timing

Product: OCZ DDR2 PC2-6400 Special Ops Edition Urban Elite
Website: http://www.ocztechnology.com
System Requirements: DDR2 capable motherboard,
Price: 1GB € 119.00, 2 GB kit €218.00

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WE PLAYED with some nice overclockable but cheap OCZ memory. The local retail shop is selling 2x1 GB of plain DDR2 667 memory and it will set you back between €160 and €180. The memory we tested costs €218 and it can reach some amazing speeds.

This is special gamer memory that, by default, comes clocked at DDR 2 800 speed at 4-4-3-15 timing. It works at 2.2 V but OCZ tolerates +-5 per cent from the voltage to reach the higher speeds. The memory is covered with an OCZ Urban Camo Motif XTC Heat spreader which is a crazy name for a memory heat spreader but at least it looks cool. The memory comes with a life time guarantee.

2GB of Camouflage OCZ DDR2 PC2-6400 Special Ops Edition Urban Elite

We used EVGA Nforce 680i as this is the best motherboard for testing memory that we've came across. We tried a few things. The first one we tested was the DDR 2 800 with 4-4-3-15 timings and all the tests were running super stable at 2.2 V. Later we tried the same memory with 5-5-5-15 timings.

Well, this was not enough and we wanted to overclock these modules at DDR 2 1066 MHz to match the Core 2 Extreme bus speed. At first we managed to do it with plain 5-5-5-15 timings. After we ran all tests rock stable at these speeds. After some tweaking we learned that these modules can work at amazing 5-4-3-12 timings. Now this is a value back for the money.

Benchmarketing

We used:
Intel Core 2 Extreme E6800, 2x 2.93GHz, 266MHz FSB, 4MB Cache
Leadtek 8800 GTS 640 MB EVGA nForce 680i SLI 775 Seagate Barracuda 7200.9 400GB SATA NCQ hard drive
Akasa EVO AK 922 Blue Athlon 64/X2/FX cooler and Intel CPU's
OCZ 700W GameXstream power supply

Quake 4	1024x768	1280x1024	?	?
OCZ Special ops 800MHz 5-5-5-15 800MHz	158.2	153.9	?	?
OCZ Special ops 800MHz 4-4-3-15 800MHz	159.4	155.2	?	?
OCZ Special ops 800MHz 5-5-5-15 1066MHz	160.5	155.6	?	?
OCZ Special ops 800MHz 5-4-3-12 1066MHz	161.5	156.3	?	?
?	?	?	?	?
Quake 4 High Quality FSAA 4X + Aniso 8X	1024x768	1280x1024	?	?
OCZ 800MHz 5-5-5-15 800MHz	147.0	122.3	?	?
OCZ 800MHz 4-4-3-15 800MHz	149.1	124.7	?	?
OCZ 800MHz 5-5-5-15 1066MHz	149.8	124.9	?	?
OCZ 800MHz 5-4-3-12 1066MHz	150.3	125.0	?	?
?	?	?	?	?
Super_Pi	1MB	8MB	?	?
OCZ 800MHz 5-5-5-15 800MHz	17s	03m 50s	?	?
OCZ 800MHz 4-4-3-15 800MHz	17s	03m 46s	?	?
OCZ 800MHz 5-5-5-15 1066MHz	17s	03m 42s	?	?
OCZ 800MHz 5-4-3-12 1066MHz	17s	03m 40s	?	?
?	?	?	?	?
Sandra 2007	Memory Bandwith	Memory Latency	Cache&Memory
OCZ 800MHz 5-5-5-15 800MHz	5727/5746	81 ns / 79.1	22866MBs /87.6	?
OCZ 800MHz 4-4-3-15 800MHz	5774/5780	76 ns / 74.0	23519MBs /81.6
OCZ 800MHz 5-5-5-15 1066MHz	5741/5748	70 ns / 68.3	23689MBs /80.4
OCZ 800MHz 5-4-3-12 1066MHz	5731/5739	70 ns / 68.1	24055MBs /77.0

At DDR2 800 speeds you can see that the better timing gives you one to two frames in Quake 4. It is not much but it is a diference. When you set the memory at 1066 MHz speeds you gain an additional frame or a bit less at 5-5-5-15 timings. With 5-4-3-12 timings you gain up to three frames compared to a 5-5-5-15 DDR 2 800 memory.

Quake 4 with 4X FSAA and 16X aniso also shows a difference. OCZ Special ops at 800MHz 4-4-3-15 about one frames faster than 5-5-5-15. OCZ Special ops 800MHz 5-4-3-12 1066MHz will run one more frame faster than 5-5-5-15 at 1066MHz and up to three frames from DDR 2 800MHz 5-5-5-15.

Then we decided to play with an ultimate tool, Super Pi. With this CPU and memory we always got 17 second at 1MB calculation. We could see the difference with 8MB test. OCZ at its top speed 800MHz 5-4-3-12 1066MHz finishes ten seconds faster then the slowest DDR 2 800 MHz 5-5-5-15 settings. The faster memory and lower timings does some calculation faster and can save some time.

The last one we tested Sandra 2007 also showed the difference. The memory bandwidth is the surprisingly fastest at Default 800MHz 4-4-3-15 timings. This is what the memory is optimised for. When it comes to memory latancy the OCZ 5-4-3-12 1066MHz is the fastest with 70 /68.1 ns latancy and this is 10 ns faster than the lowest clocked 5-5-5-15 DDR 2 800 MHz memory. The cache and memory test is again dominant at brilliant 5-4-3-12 timings. You gain more than 1300 MB/s in cache speed test and 10 better in memory score.

Great timings at DDR 2 800, 4-3-4-15

In Short
I won't go into any more details but I do recommend this memory. For €220 you can get 2x1 GB of this memory that worked at 5-4-3-2 speeds at 1066 MHz. Even at DDR 2 800 MHz mode it runs a nice 4-4-3-15 timings and you can not argue with that. It is affordable and with Vista in sight this absolutely makes sense and 2 GB is the right size. Well if you can afford it you can get even more but games such as Battlefield 2142 wont run smooth without 2 GB memory.

With Vista in site and new games with DirectX 10 at horizon you will definitely need to make a move from 512 MB to 1 GB or from 1 GB to 2 GB for more then just casual gamers. That's what the Vole wants from you and this memory looks like a good choice.

The Good
Great price
4-4-3-15 at 800 MHz
5-4-3-12 at 1066 MHz

The Bad
Not everyone likes the camouflage colours

The Ugly
You don't have it in your PC