Mushkin Redline Ascent 3x2GB PC3-12800 C6 Memory Review

Stability Testing & Overclocking

Hopefully you have all heard my spiel before about memory stability, but in case you haven't, here it is again in all its boring glory.

Memory stability, what constitutes stable? What is not considered stable? These questions get hotly debated in enthusiast forums all over the internet like little brush fires on the fringe of an inferno that play havoc with forest fire crews. Everyone has their own opinion about stability, especially when it comes to memory stability. For some, stable means they can do whatever it is on their computer without it crashing, blue-screening, or restarting; whether that means gaming or just surfing the internet. To this user, stable means simply using the computer as they normally would.

Of course, that is not what we would call stable and we do a lot more thorough testing before labeling a memory frequency/timing stable. One of the toughest types of programs on a system has been found to be distributed computing projects such as Rosetta@Home, Folding@Home, World Community Grid, and more. Running 24/7 crunching for one of these great causes is a sure way to find holes in a system if there is truly some instability, unfortunately it takes a considerable amount of time to use them for stability testing so we use the list of programs below to all but guarantee the system to be 24/7 distributed computing stable:

• 8 threads of 32M SuperPi Mod 1.5 (ran at the same time using Hyper Pi 0.99b)
• 2 hours of 8 threads of Prime95 using Prime95 v25.7 Stress Testing Blend
• 2 hours of HCI MemTest Pro in Windows using all available memory
• 6 loops of 3DMark Vantage ran back to back

As you can see, stability testing can mean any number of things to any number of people. We obviously aren't going to satisfy everyone's needs and some we are going to over satisfy with our testing methodology. The one item we haven't discussed is the role that the processor plays in memory clocking. With the i7 memory controller being on the CPU die, the strength of said memory controller is going to determine the strength of a memory overclock. With this kit of Mushkin Redline Ascent memory where tight timings are the primary role, the memory controller's strength shouldn't come into play as higher frequencies tend to be what really pushes the CPU. Needless to say, we don't anticipate any problems with this memory at the stock clocks despite the extremely tight timings.

Before we get to any overclocking, we first want to quickly test this memory at the specified frequency and timings. With the included XMP profiles, this was a breeze on the EVGA X58 3X SLI motherboard. We simply went into the BIOS and enabled the XMP profile. We zipped through the stability testing and quickly tried the stock settings with a little lower voltage as we knew the motherboard was already under-volting the memory. We were pleasantly surprised by what we found, blown away to be honest. To double check our findings to ensure nothing strange was going on, we moved the kit over to the Classified and tested the XMP profiles there, but with the reduced voltage we were finding stable on the regular EVGA X58 board. Have a look at both screen shots, pay particular attention to the voltages listed in E-LEET. These voltages are what is set in the BIOS, and don't forget, the regular X58 3X SLI under volts memory under load by 0.05v.

Now we understand that this kit of memory is binned for DDR3-1600 operation at 6-7-6-18 with 1.65v, but being able to run through our entire suite of stability testing at just 1.45v and 1.50v is absolutely incredible in our opinions. Memory guru's all agree that DDR3-1600 6-7-6 with only 1.65v is quite impressive, wait until they see the memory run at much less voltage than that. Obviously this is just a single kit but even still. Please don't hesitate to join us in the forums to show off your kits of this memory at stock settings with low voltage.

XMP testing on both EVGA boards obviously went as easy as could be. Mushkin has a good XMP profile that sets VTT at 1.4v which isn't too high, but definitely more than enough for any setup. We really don't anticipate any issues for users of this kit simply looking to run the XMP profile. With the knowledge that stock settings run fine at 1.50v, we couldn't wait to get this kit clocking, let's take a look at the results.

With such tight timings at a relatively low voltage, we weren't quite sure how this kit was going to handle higher clocks and looser timings. We also weren't sure how far this kit would go with the tight timings of 6-7-6, but based on the stock clocks at 1.50v testing we did, we were certain we had some head room. Needless to say, we have a bit of a mixed bag of results on our hands. There is plenty to explain so let's start with the numbers and go through them one at a time.

This is definitely one of the more odd kits we have looked at here at Hardware Canucks. We start off with the overclocking of the rated timings and voltage. Keeping in mind that our EVGA X58 3X SLI droops vDIMM under load by 0.05v, we set voltage to 1.70v so load vDIMM was right at 1.65v. With the specified timings of 6-7-6-18 1T, we managed a very impressive overclock of 868MHz or DDR3-1736. This was completely expected as we found the XMP profile to run easily at 1.50v. What caught us off guard was the fact that adding voltage, did absolutely nothing for clocking at 6-7-6. So despite the impressive overclock at 1.65v, the overall clocking at this timing set was disappointing because voltage didn't help this kit. We quickly found out what was limiting a frequency increase, tRCD.

You will notice the grey bar, our second timing set, having only a slight variation in timing changes for a very substantial frequency increase. Loosening up tRCD to 8 instead of 7, lifted the wall at 868MHz that we found and let us run this kit right up to 963MHz or DDR3-1926, at 6-8-6-20 1T! We have to admit that this is the first time we have run any memory at 6-8-6, but 963MHz is a very high frequency to be running CAS 6 through our stability testing. Clearly these IC's have some distinct characteristics. They have an almost brick wall at a certain frequency at 6-7-6 timings, but simply opening up tRCD to 8 unleashes some incredible head room for a rather well priced kit of memory.

Our overclocking headroom slowly dried up as timings were further loosened but we did manage to hit 1000MHz or DDR3-2000 stable at 8-9-8. Although this is nice, the sweet spot for this memory is in the 950MHz range with timings of 6-8-6. We are actually quite anxious to start seeing others users results to determine if our kit was simply a bit of a freak at 6-8-6, or if other kits will find similar walls at 6-7-6 broken down by opening up tRCD to 8. Overall this Mushkin Redline Ascent memory caught us off guard with this type of scaling, and lack thereof in a sense.

So if you do grab a set of this memory, or the standard Redline modules of the same specifications, be sure to stop by our memory section in the forums for the discussion thread on this memory to share your results.