Corsair Dominator 3x2GB PC3-12800 C8 Memory Review

Gaming Benchmarks

It was mentioned earlier that the reason we through in the 3x1GB results was primarily to confirm or refute the findings that Corsairs internal testing found when comparing a 3x2GB setup to 3x1GB setup in respects to gaming on the Vista platform. They used dual GTX 280s showing some pretty significant gains in certain games but we thought it would interesting to see if the same held true for a single GTX 280, and with a rather efficient Vista installation. Here is the link to the Corsair internal results when comparing 3x1GB to 3x2GB in Vista. Keep in mind, they used 2 x GTX 280 video cards, we will be using a single for comparison sake...AN811: Gaming Performance Analysis - 6GB vs 3GB. We don't have an exhaustive list of games to test but we will benchmark our normal suite and the results could possibly be quite interesting, let's get started.

We have forced ourselves to step up to 3DMark Vantage results for all reviews because the public demands it. 3DMark Vantage is the newest in a long line of 3D benchmarking software from Futuremark and is the most elaborate to date. Featuring multiple presets for various system configurations, Vantage is the culmination of all 3DMarks past relying on system and GPU power for its results. We will stick to the Performance preset as it seems to be the most popular at this point in time.

With the 3DMark benching we really don't see a difference between 3GB and 6GB setups. In fact, the difference between any of the three overclocked setups is minimal at best. Memory isn't really playing an important role in 3DMark results it appears, at least not with these configurations.

We all know what Crysis is and how much it beats up systems but we wanted to add it to the gaming benchmarks to see how system changes can improve performance on a mid-level system. Detail levels are all set to Very High with the resolution at 1680x1050 with 4xAA. We ran the benchmarks with a demo of the Sphere level in DX9 and 64-bit. The game looks great with this setup and plays just well enough to keep us happy.

Moving on to Crysis we can again see a pretty consist result set, only this time across the entire range of the spectrum. The stock clocks with CPU frequency 700MHz slower has no problem keeping up with the rest of the group. Minimum frame rates drop the slightest bit but nothing to really consider a sizeable result. Crysis is obviously a video card killer and the settings we have gone with are playable with a single GTX 280 but it is quite evident that a single GTX 280 is the bottleneck for this benchmark.

Another new fall release of this past silly season Far Cry 2 has some beautiful scenery but does lack that buttery smooth game play in places. A lot of moaning and groaning has occurred with Far Cry 2 but acceptable frame rates are much easier to achieve than Crysis and the game play is plenty smooth enough to enjoy. We were really able to crank up the settings with this benchmark on this setup.

The equality pattern continues for Far Cry 2. Here is a game that absolutely screams with a pair of GTX 280s but only plays as well as Crysis with a single card. Of course we have the details set very high and are running with DX10, but the game is more than playable at these settings in this configuration. It is really starting to look like Corsairs internal testing was indicative of a system that wasn't as heavily bottlenecked by the GPU as we were here with a single card. This is perhaps why they were seeing the gains they did with dual GTX 280s.

The first of our FRAPS captured frame rate games, Fallout 3 is a little bit of everything. First person shooter meets landscape wanderer and adventure finder. Playing Fallout 3 can become quite addictive and the nature of the game can have hours disappear behind you without having a clue. For our benchmarking today we ran around the landscape just outside vault 101 up to Washington and then back towards Megaton for some fire ant battles. FRAPS was used to record the frame rates so keep this in mind when comparing results, game play was similar but without a time demo, it definitely varies.

Again, we see a slight dip in the minimum frame rates with the 3x1GB setup which might indicate a weakness to that setup that could be further exploited by more GPU processing power but no conclusive results. Fallout 3 obviously isn't a real GPU killer as our average FPS is around the 70 mark for all setups, but with details levels maxed it can still put a decent load on the video card.

The latest installment of Call of Duty is not unlike the last with high frame rates easily achievable with settings maxed at 1680x1050. This is especially true with this setup and a single GTX 280. We have no problems running full tilt with every detail level set to the max and that is how we benchmarked. We again used FRAPS to record frame rates of the Little Resistance level from the time we leave the boat up to near the end of the level where we enter the hut. Total play time is 10 minutes with the same amount of time spent in the underground bunker for each run. Again, results will have slightly larger margins for error due to the nature of benchmarking actual game play versus a time demo.

Our last set of numbers comes from COD: World At War, and like the rest, we see no difference between any of the setups. Even in a non-time demo environment of testing, the 3x1GB kit of memory just didn't show a weakness, aside from the couple of instances where the minimum FPS dropped off a bit from the rest of the pack. As we mentioned earlier, this was an exhaustive testing to explore this issue formally. We simply wanted to see if the Corsair results would show up with a single card instead of SLI'd GTX 280s. As it turns out, the inconclusiveness of the results might have just given us our answer. It appears we might have to follow up on this testing somewhere down the road. Perhaps a bone stock Vista install or more GPU power, like Corsair used, would show more of difference amongst memory kits?