SyncMAX PC2-5400 DDR2

Overclocking

Overclocking these modules should be interesting for a couple of reasons. The first being that they are running tight timings that I hope by loosening up a bit we can get some nice headroom. On the flip side, without any heatspreaders, we have to wonder if the increased head of higher bus speeds and increased voltage will have an effect and how much.

We set the memory to DDR2-667 in the BIOS, loosened the timings up to 5-5-5-16, bumped the voltage up and let 'er rip. The highest 'semi'-stable overclock we could reach was 20 MHz on the front side bus giving us a CPU frequency of just over 3GHz with a memory speed of 733MHz (366*2). 

  

I said 'semi'-stable because while the system would run just fine at these settings, it would only handle it for about four hours under load. After that time, the system would lock up and require a hard shutdown (i.e. pulling the cord out). I reached down and placed my fingers on the memory and came away smarting from the heat. 

Conclusion

Concord Idea Corp provided us with this set of their SyncMAX EXpress DDR2-533 memory a couple of weeks ago and from a normal usage perspective the memory lived up to Concord's claims of tight timings at both DD2-533 and DDR2-667. Besides just straight out testing of the memory and intensive benchmarks, I've been using them every day and I have not complaints. While they lagged a bit behind our Corsair memory in Sandra 2007 and Super PI, you can't tell a difference in day to day use. With a price tag of $99.00 (as listed on their site), I'm inclined to recommend them to anyone wanting a good solid set of memory without dropping too fat a wad of cash.

The downside is that they have very short legs when it comes to overclocking and they do get very hot causing system instability while overclocking. Heatspreaders would help with this issue and this is something that we intend on revisiting in the future with some aftermarket memory sinks. 

Pros:

• Good price

• Solid performance

• Tight timings

• Quality control (all manufacturing and assembly done by Concord Idea)

Cons:

• Not good overclockers

• No heatspreaders

• Just a bit behind in the benchmarks

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