Crucial PC3200 Memory Review - Conclusion
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In choosing parts for your computer there are a few things to take into consideration, but the most important one is to make sure that the part fits the task. If you are planning on overclocking a Pentium 4 2.4C to 4 GHz, then you will need the appropriate memory, cooling, and motherboard to do that. If you are looking for hardware for home or office use, then make sure the part is designed to perform well at office and home computing tasks. Crucial's PC3200 RAM is designed to do just that.
Clocking in at DDR400 with a default timing set of 3-3-3, and able to work in a dual channel configuration, this memory performs really well. It is only slightly behind my gigabyte of RAM from Infineon, but please keep in mind that most office tasks won't put the memory through its paces the way I did. Microsoft Office does not require excessive amounts of memory bandwidth, nor do the latest games. Most programs will be useable with this memory installed in their computer. If you think buying one stick of memory for 512 MB is better than buying two at 256 MB, think again. Dual channel supporting motherboards are almost everywhere now, and it would be foolish to not take advantage of it. My benchmarks showed up to 25% performance drops by not using the dual channel capabilities of a motherboard.
There are some performance gains to be had by overclocking. I was able to obtain a 20% gain in speed by overclocking this memory. You may be able to go higher if stability is not an issue with you. If you are really worried about performance, this is not for you, especially with PC4400 memory available.
Having said that, please note that there is a difference between running 512 MB and 1 GB of memory; while playing games will be fine for most people, loading games will take more time if you have 512 MB of RAM. There is an advantage to having 1 GB of memory, and you can feel the difference when your operating system of choice loads. This is due to the fact that memory is significantly faster than your Windows swap file or Linux swap partition. Sometimes, when the hard drive light is blinking while loading the maps to your favourite game loads, its because Windows is writing to the swap file to swap out a program and not necessarily hard drive reads caused by loading the maps into memory.
If support is an issue for you, then don't overclock the RAM since it will void the warranty. However, Crucial has a great reputation for making quality memory products, and I would not hesitate to recommend Crucial to anyone who had a home or office system and was looking towards upgrading. Their website currently has the memory I tested at $49.99 US (about $75 Canadian) which may be a bit pricey for some, but is worth it. I've seen generic memory fail before, but I've yet to see any memory fail from Crucial or any other big name manufacturer.
To summarize:
Highs
- Perfect for home/office
- Crucial's great reputation for support
- Has overclocking headroom
Lows
- A bit expensive
- Not on the bleeding edge of memory technology
- 512 MB may not be enough RAM for you
I'd like to thank Crucial for the opportunity to review their products, and you for taking the time to read through this analysis. If you have any questions, comments, props, or flames about the review, please feel free to stop into the Dev Hardware forums and voice your opinion.
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