Kingston HyperX T1 Series DDR3-2000 3GB Triple Channel Memory Kit Review

About a year ago, I was in a telephone conversation with a Kingston tech. I had a couple of questions about some memory I was reviewing, and our Kingston rep lined up a conference call between him, the tech, and myself. Looking back, the questions I had were pretty stupid, but I am still very glad I had the great conversation with the tech, whose name is Louis.

First, Louis let me know that not only is he an enthusiast, he’s an extreme overclocker. I guess I could say that it gave me comfort knowing that at least some of the guys that design our hardware actually do the same things that we do with it.

Louis had recently attended a conference that Intel had given for their partners. He was very excited about the conference, and made the remark that Intel had some really exciting things in the works. Of course, he couldn’t tell me what those things were, but you could tell he was really fired up about them.

In retrospect, the information that Louis had just received obviously was about the Nehalem. After seeing the improvements that the i7 has over the Core 2, I can fully understand his excitement.

Today I will be looking at the result of Louis’ excitement, Kingston’s HyperX DDR3-2000 3GB Triple Channel kit. These memory modules sport beautiful new pin-fin heat spreaders and 9-9-9-27 timings at 1.65v. Will this Kingston kit carry my new i7 920 to glory? Read on to see!

Specifications:
– CL(IDD) 9 cycles
– Row Cycle Time (tRCmin) 49.5ns (min.)
– Refresh to Active/Refresh Command Time (tRFCmin) 110ns
– Row Active Time (tRASmin) 36ns (min.)
– Power 1.296 W (operating per module)
– UL Rating 94 V – 0
– Operating Temperature 0C to 85C
– Storage Temperature -55C to +100C
– JEDEC standard 1.5V +/- 0.075V Power Supply
– VDDQ = 1.5V +/- 0.075V
– 667MHz fCK for 1333Mb/sec/pin
– 8 independent internal banks
– Programmable CAS Latency: 6,7,8,9
– Posted CAS
– Programmable Additive Latency: 0, CL – 2, or CL – 1 clock
– Programmable CAS Write Latency(CWL) = 9(DDR3-1333)
– 8-bit pre-fetch
– Burst Length: 8 (Interleave without any limit, sequential with starting address “000” only), 4 with tCCD = 4 which does not allow seamless read or write [either on the fly using A12 or MRS]
– Bi-directional Differential Data Strobe
– Internal(self) calibration : Internal self calibration through ZQ pin (RZQ : 240 ohm +/- 1%)
– On Die Termination using ODT pin
– Average Refresh Period 7.8us at lower then TCASE 85C, 3.9us at 85C < TCASE . 95C
– Asynchronous Reset
– PCB : Height 2.401″ (61.00mm) w/ heatsink, single sided component

Packaging
My HyperX came in this cardboard box. I’m not sure if this is the retail packaging or not, I assume that it is. The modules are packaged in tinted static-free wrap.

Kingston HyperX T1 Series DDR3-2000 3GB Triple Channel Memory Kit Kingston HyperX T1 Series DDR3-2000 3GB Triple Channel Memory Kit Kingston HyperX T1 Series DDR3-2000 3GB Triple Channel Memory Kit