Intro

Ultra Products mentioned to me in a previous review that they were looking to expand their customer base to include hardcore computer enthusiasts and gamers. They certainly took a big step in the right direction when they started producing the excellent X-Connect Power Supply. Another product that they are hoping will appeal to the enthusiast crowd is their line of RAM. The RAM sticks that I'm reviewing here is their high-end PC4000 1GB Dual Channel kit.

Package

Talk about stylin', the memory arrived in a Mahogany presentation box. Even though the box suffered a couple of dings during shipping, I was still impressed. The hinges on the box are gold plated and "Ultra" is embossed in gold on top. I know that sending the sticks in this box is a little over the top, but it's good over the top. Sure does make you sit up and take notice.

Inside there are cutouts in the anti-static material for the memory sticks to reside in luxury. The heat spreaders on the sticks are aluminum and appropriately gold colored. I almost hated to pull the RAM out of there. Almost.

The RAM

The back side of the RAM sticks have a holographic sticker printed with the part number (ULT31084), the speed of the RAM (PC4000 500MHz), the size of each stick (512MB), and a "Warranty Void if Removed" statement. I would leave the sticker alone since Ultra Products gives a lifetime warranty for this RAM. The sticks are certified to run CAS2 @ 400MHz DDR and 500MHz DDR @ CAS3. The timings for 500MHz are 3.4.4.8. I was able to get a peek at the memory chips by bending the hell out of one corner of the heat spreader (there goes my warranty) and saw that they are using Hynix HY5DU56822BT-D5 chips. The access time for these chips is rated at 5 nanoseconds. I looked around the web and could find lots of information on the -D4 and -D43 Hynix chips, but nothing on the D5 so I am assuming they are new. Ultra Products states that they test each module a minimum of 3 times and guarantee's compatibility with all DDR motherboards.

Performance

Now for some testing. The board I'm using is the Shuttle AN51R nForce3 250 (reviewed here), not only because that happens to be the board currently on my testbench, but because of the excellent PCI speed lock that 250 boards have which helps RAM overclocking immensely. The CPU is a 3200+ Newcastle and the rest doesn't really matter since I'm focused only on the RAM. I used 4.4.8 timings but changed the CAS latency during testing. I always use 2.7V for my RAM voltage under normal conditions so that is what I used starting out.

The first thing I did was set it up for 400MHz at CAS2 to ensure there was no problem with that, there wasn't. I compared my Sandra Memory test results at 400MHz against a GB of PMI RAM at the same settings and the results were within 3 points, so I knew the speeds of the Ultra RAM were valid. I upped the Ultra RAM to 420, then 430, then 440 all at CAS2 and at 2.7V. By now my jaw was hanging down because I was amazed at how high it would clock at CAS2. I shot for 450MHz but it wouldn't do it at 2.7V, so I increased voltage to 2.8. Bam, booted right up. By now my CPU was running at 2475 but was stable as could be.

I couldn't get to 460MHz even when I increased the voltage to 2.9 but I think that was CPU related, so I dropped the timing to 10X. That did the trick, still at CAS2. Next I tried 470, 480, and 490, but I couldn't get it to do anything for me no matter what I did. So I did the only rational thing, I went straight for 500MHz. I kept the voltage at 2.9 and dropped the timing to 9X and dropped the CAS latency to 2.5. Still nothing so I changed the latency to 3. Guess what, booted straight into Windows and again was perfectly stable. The highest I was able to get it to boot into Windows was 506MHz but it wasn't stable, so 500MHz is about all I could squeeze out of it.

Conclusion

Ultra Products has one hell of a good product here; RAM that will run CAS2 at 460 and can run stable at 500MHz. I've saved the best part of this RAM for the end of this review...the price. You can pick up these two sticks of 512MB PC4000 RAM for about $250. Compare that to other well known manufacturer's who get $160 a stick for their PC4000 RAM. A gigabyte of loose RAM for $250 bucks is a deal that is hard to pass up. I didn't mess with any of the timings except for the CAS latency, but I would imagine that experimenting would squeeze even more performance out of it. Right now I have the testbench running Folding@Home at 2475 with the memory at 450MHz. Too sweet.Because of the high clock and low price, I award the Ultra Products PC4000 1GB Ram Kit 9 out of 10 and the highly sought after PimpRig Pimp Gear Award.

PimpRig Rating //
(9 pimp hats)

Thanks go out to Ultra Products for providing this RAM to PimpRig for review.