
They buy those from semiconductor foundries, which means all the RAM on the market comes from a few main places only: Samsung, Micron, and Hynix.Īdditionally, the flashy kits of memory that are rated for 4000+ Mhz at low CAS latencies are the same thing as the “slow” memory that cost half the price. You may buy your RAM from G.Skill, Crucial, or Corsair, but those companies don’t make the actual DDR4 memory chips that make your RAM tick. If you want to learn more about what each timing really means, you can read this guide from Gamers Nexus. But CAS latency is only one of many different timings and clocks that make RAM work the rest are generally just referred to as “RAM timings.” The lower and tighter the timings are, the faster your RAM will be. This is usually tied to the RAM speed-higher speed, higher CAS latency.

It’s usually referred to as “CL” after the RAM speed, for instance, “3200 Mhz CL16.” CAS latency is a measure of how many clock cycles there are between the READ command being sent to the memory stick and the CPU getting a response back. They are a measure of latency (how fast your RAM responds). RAM timings and CAS latency are a different measure of speed. Anything higher than the stock JEDEC speeds is an overclock, meaning XMP is simply a JEDEC profile that has been overclocked by the factory.

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It accomplishes this at the hardware level with a chip on the RAM itself called a serial presence detect chip, so there’s only ever one XMP profile per stick:Įvery kit of RAM actually has multiple speeds baked into it the stock speeds use the same presence detection system, and are called JEDEC. XMP is essentially the RAM telling the system, “Hey, I know DDR4 is only supposed to support speeds up to 2666 Mhz, but why don’t you go ahead and overclock me to the speed on the box?” It’s an overclock from the factory, already pre-tuned, tested, and ready to go. This is because of XMP (Extreme Memory Profile). So really, the speed is 1200 Mhz, or 2400 mega-ticks per second.īut most DDR4 RAM is usually 3000 Mhz, 3200 Mhz, or higher. Though this is actually a bit of a marketing lie DDR stands for “Double Data Rate,” meaning the RAM reads and writes twice for every clock cycle. The “stock” speed for DDR4 (the newest memory type) is usually 2133 Mhz or 2400 Mhz. RAM speed is generally measured in megahertz, usually abbreviated as “Mhz.” This is a measure of the clock speed (how many times per second the RAM can access its memory) and is the same way CPU speed is measured. Though if you’re trying this on a laptop, you’ll want to verify that you’re able to clear CMOS (to reset the BIOS to default settings) if something does go wrong. Even on unstable overclocks, the worst that happens is you’ll get an error when testing for stability and be kicked back to the drawing board. With memory, they don’t produce much heat at all, so it’s quite safe. An overclocked CPU or GPU can be much louder than one running at stock settings. When you overclock a CPU, you have to worry about whether or not your cooling will handle the faster clocks. Overclocking RAM isn’t nearly as scary or unsafe as overclocking a CPU or GPU. This is called microstuttering, and it can make games feel choppy even when the average frame rate is high. Where RAM speed really shines is in minimum framerates for example, when you load a new area or new objects in a game, if it all has to happen in one frame, that frame could take longer than usual if it’s waiting on the memory to load. The average frame rate is usually boosted a few percentage points with faster RAM when the CPU is doing most of the work. Take a look at this benchmark from Linus Tech Tips: Each frame might only have a few milliseconds to process a lot of data, so if the game you’re playing is CPU bound (like CSGO), faster RAM can improve framerates. In games though, RAM speed can actually have a noticeable effect.

In day-to-day tasks, the RAM being a few nanoseconds faster might not matter, but if you’re really crunching numbers, any small performance improvement can help. Improving the speed at which your RAM runs can directly improve your CPU’s performance in certain situations, though there is a point of diminishing returns when the CPU simply can’t churn through more memory fast enough. Once it’s loaded, it usually stays there for a while, being accessed by the CPU whenever it needs it. Every program you run gets loaded into RAM from your SSD or hard drive, which are comparatively much slower.
