Last weekend, I decided to test the memory performance of my ASRock 775Dual-VSTA motherboard paired with the Mushkin EM2 1 GB DDR2-667 memory kit.
Specifically, I was eager to determine the maximum memory bandwidth I could attain using DDR2-553 memory timings (4-4-4-12 stock), while acknowledging that the ASRock 775Dual-VSTA performs poorly with the standard DDR2-667 memory timings (5-5-5-12 stock). Hence, all tests below were completed with the memory timings set to DDR2-533. EVEREST Ultimate Edition 2006 was the benchmark utility of choice. CPU used: Intel Core 2 Duo E6400 (stock configuration with Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro HSF).
Test 1 (CL-tRCD-tRP-tRAS):
4-4-4-12, CR: 2T
Memory Bandwidth (Read): 10,136 MB/s
Test 2:
3-3-3-8, CR: 2T
Memory Bandwidth (Read): 11,274 MB/s
Test 3:
3-3-3-8, CR: 1T
Memory Bandwidth (Read): 11,785 MB/s
Surprisingly, the Mushkin memory kit ran using a command rate of 1T using DDR2-533 timings! In contrast, I could only squeeze about 9.9 GB/s of bandwidth using DDR2-667 stock timings.
I also tested the integer performance of the Intel Core 2 Duo E6400 (2 x 2.13 GHz) and the AMD X2 4200+ (2 x 2.2 GHz) CPU, both running at stock configuration. The motherboard used for the X2 4200+ was the ASRock 939DUAL-SATA2. Benchmark: SuperPi – 1.1e — displays the time required to calculate a specified number of digits of Pi.
Intel Core 2 Duo E6400 vs AMD X2 4200+ S939
512K – 10 seconds | 512K – 18 seconds
1M – 26 seconds | 1M – 40 seconds
The E6400 is clocked at 2.13 GHz, with the X2 4200+ clocked at 2.2 GHz. However, even with the deficit in speed, the E6400 can outperform the X2 4200+ by more than 45%.