Ballistix Elite 32GB DDR4-3466: Breaking the 2T Barrier

Ballistix Elite 3466 - Breaking the 2T Barrier Ballistix Elite 32GB DDR4-3466: Breaking the 2T Barrier Not all that long ago we took a deep dive into the Ballistix Tactical series and walked away impressed with its value. One thing that we briefly touched on was that the Tactical is orientated more towards the value end of the spectrum than performance when compared to the Elite series - as the Elite series really are performance at all cost kits meant for the hardcore crowd. Many readers did ask us what exactly was the real world difference between these two lines are. So today we are going to show exactly what that difference is using a rather impressive kit of Ballistix Elite DDR4-3466 kit of RAM. On the surface the Elite models are going to be better choice as they are built to a much higher standard. They use heatsinks that are almost thick enough to be considered armor, they undergo a lot more factory testing, and generally speaking are going to be the best choice when price is of only secondary concern. On the other hand they also cost noticeably more – as there is no such thing as a free lunch. For example a Ballistic Tactical DDR4-3000 32GB kit (the fastest in the Tactical line-up) will set buyers back about $340, whereas this Elite kit retails for about 370USD – or about $11.56 cents a Gigabyte, or about a couple cents a GB less than what Corsair and G.Skill are asking for their version. So today we are going to show what that extra up-front cost actually get you. In typical RHR fashion we are also going to answer another question that many readers asked us. Specifically many, many emails we received was about 32GB kits of RAM and Ryzen. A lot of people simply feel that 16GB is not enough and they need 32GB of random access memory. Almost all of these emails wanted us to show what compromises they would have to accept in order to get 32GB of RAM on their new shiny Ryzen system. That is not exactly an easy answer as we dislike making any compromises when it comes to performance vs capacity. Yet this is usually what you have to be willing to do if you don’t want to pay the Intel tax. Its ‘common knowledge’ that Ryzen is finicky when it comes to high capacity RAM. Its usually not a ‘plug and play’ solution like it is on Intel. This is because Ryzen is a generation one architecture design that really does appear to be designed with two sticks of 4-8GB DDR4 configurations – whereas Intel is using an 8th generation architecture. That too is why we reached out to Ballistix and got them to send a set of RAM that conclusively proves that you really don’t have to make compromises on performance vs capacity… you just have to be willing to compromise on your budget. As we will show you in the coming pages this kit really is something special and really does justify its asking price – which to be fair is actually a couple dollars less than G.Skill or Corsair’s versions. So sit back, relax, and be prepared to be amazed at what a sub-$400 kit of 32GB performance RAM can offer Ryzen owners! Ballistix Elite 3466 - Specifications and Features Ballistix Elite 3466 - Closer Look Ballistix Elite 3466 - Closer Look Let’s start with the obvious in that using four sticks instead of two is seemingly harder to get to work with Ryzen systems. The fact is that since A.G.E.S.A. 1.0.0.6a (AMD Generic Encapsulated Software Architecture) update landed this really is not the case… or is not as long as you use Samsung B-Die based DDR4 sticks. Our personal experience is that four 8GB sticks actually work better, and are less temperamental, on average compared to two 16GB sticks. This is because AMD has worked hard to make their new Ryzen tech work with as wide a range of RAM as possible. They still have a ways to go, especially with 16GB or higher density sticks, but with 4GB and 8GB sticks it is no longer the critical issue it was when Ryzen was first released. Just make sure that if you are going for DDR4-3000 or higher to opt for Samsung and not Hynix based RAM. Most of our issues with 32GB kits can be traced back to a given model using Hynix, not Samsung, and trying to go above DDR4-2666. Honestly at 2666 and even 2800 it really does not matter all that much. It just matters when you are looking for no compromises. No compromises on capacity. No compromises on performance. Then it does matter. As you can see, the Ballistix Elite DDR4-3446 kit is indeed using Samsung B-Die’s to power this kit of RAM. For those interested the free Thaiphoon Burner program (found here http://www.softnology.biz/files.html) will easily confirm that your set of RAM is also Samsung and not Hynix based. As such if you are running into Mister Murphy this would be the first thing we would check. If it is Hynix… there is your answer. Hynix sets can be made to work, most of the time, but it does take a lot more TLC than Sammy IC’s. Next, on first blush four sticks means twice the command latency of 2T vs 1T. If you are using a low end motherboard this can actually still be worth considering. However, as we will show in the overclocking section a sub-two hundred dollar (USD) motherboard had zero issues pushing our CPU’s IMC and our Ballistix Elite sample to 1T rates – at relatively tight timings we might add. This too makes it easier to justify going for 32GB of random access memory instead of 16GB that was the ‘safe bet’ when Ryzen landed. With that out of the way let’s take a closer look at the Ballistix Elite 4x8GB DDR4-3446 kit that we were able to obtain for this review. Actually, let’s start with a brief rundown on Ballistix’s three main lines. We have gone over this in the past but it bears repeating. Ballistix actually does overlap frequencies a bit on their lines so choosing the right model is just as important, if not more, as choosing the speed. As a ‘Tl;DR’ the Sport is for value orientated consumers who prize price over shear performance, Elite is for performance enthusiasts who don’t like to make compromises on anything besides their budget, and Tactical is the everyman kit which offers good value and good performance but is not the best at either – as it is a balancing act between these two main considerations. When in doubt it is hard to go wrong with going up a step from what you think - as all you will be doing is wasting a couple bucks and not end up being frustrated with the performance a given model is capable of. Of course it is best to actually choose the right model for your needs so as to not waste either time nor money… but when in doubt Tactical or Elite is hard to beat. So what is the differences between these three series? Or put another way what makes an Elite an Elite and not a Tactical? After all, they all come in the same plastic clamshell packaging. All come with a lifetime warranty. All are even reasonably priced for their class. First and foremost is factory binning. The Elite goes through a lot more factory testing and binning with only the cream of the crop making the ‘Elite’ grade. Then they are binned on frequency performance and voltage requirements. This is where things can get a touch confusing. The Sport / Sport LT series comes in frequencies that range from DDR4-2400 to DDR4-266. The Tactical series goes from DDR4-2666 to DDR4-3200, and the Elite is DDR4-2666 to DDR4-3600. However, the timings at a given frequency are where they differ. Sport’s have looser timings than Tactical, and Tactical have looser than Elites. Basically if you want tight timings at higher frequencies the Elite is the best choice, whereas if you want tight timings at lower speeds… the Tactical is probably good enough as honestly, the difference really will not be noticed by many. The next way they vary is in the robustness of their heat spreaders and heatsink design. All three lines are fairly low-profile, but the Elite is the tallest and thickest as they need the extra mass to keep the RAM cool when pushed to the very edge. Basically the Sport uses thin heatsinks that are darn near standard height profile and are mainly for aesthetics more than performance – they still do move heat but not nearly as effectively as the Tactical. The Tactical is a bit better with heatsinks that can actually move a surprisingly amount of heat away from the memory modules… but the Elite’s are thicker and noticeably heavy in comparison. Equally important the Elite series, like the DDR4-3446 reviewed today, may only be slightly taller but the top of each DIMM has a – relatively – massive hunk of metal on top. This in conjunction with the integrated (small) cooling fins means that any air moving over the top of the Elite DIMMS (say via a CPU cooler’s fan) means that not only is the heat removed from the memory modules but then radiated efficiently into the air. At this critical task the Elite’s heatsink design works better than many taller heatsink designs and really is good enough to not need active cooling. We pushed this kit hard and even on an open test bench they never got more than slightly warm to the touch. When installed in a case with good airflow we truly doubt that 99.999 percent of people will ever find their cooling abilities lacking. This certainly is a good thing as the other major difference between the series is that the Elites are meant for overclocking. All that factory testing and binning means that they can not only hit their factory specifications but will have more overclocking headroom than lower priced Tactical lines. The only potential downside to opting for Elite over Tactical or Sport is in the aesthetics department. While yes an aggressive ‘military styling’ consisting of black is indeed fairly flexible… ‘basic black’ is the only color option for the Elite DDR4 series. Whereas the Tactical comes (only) in a gray, and the Sport/Sport LT comes in gray, white and red. Thus if you are looking to make a custom build designed around a color scheme that black will clash with… you will have to either compromise on color or performance. Ballistix Elite 3466 - Testing Methodology Ballistix Elite 3466 - Testing Methodology The reasons to purchase a high performance RAM kit are as varied as the consumers who purchase them. For some application load time is the deciding factor in their purchasing decision. For others it is Virtualized Operating System performance. For others still it is game load times. For others still it is to shave a .1 of second off their synthetic test scores so as to climb ever higher in the online rankings that various sites host. With such a wide variety of criteria it behooves us to use as wide and varied a list of testing protocols as possible. As such we have used a blend of synthetic and real world benchmarks, as well as custom real world game benchmarking. To further highlight the impact RAM has on performance we have chosen an AMD Ryzen 7 based system. Due to Infinity Fabric being tied to RAM speeds the impact from changing the RAM frequency will indeed have a real world impact that will be noticeable to all. However, latency also plays a role in overall system performance. Typically higher frequencies require looser timings than lower frequencies. While most will opt for higher frequencies over tighter timings, as higher Data/Infinity Fabric speed usually is more important that RAM timings, there can be times when finding the best balance between the two is needed. For this reason we are not only including lowest and highest frequency results but also the typical speeds in-between, and at all frequencies tested we will include the timings used. With this data you can see what combination will work for you and your needs, and if it the review sample is indeed the correct choice. To show the performance differences we have tested at stock, ‘XMP’, and then manual overclocking levels. All tests were run 4 times and average results are represented. For overclocking we do not overclock the CPU and rather only the RAM is overclocked to show performance gains that the RAM will net consumers. To ensure that any overclock we do obtain is realist we also limit voltage to – at most – 1.40volts. Anything above this bordering on dangerous to the RAM and will noticeably reduce the longevity of the DDR4 RAM ICs. Main Test System Processor : AMD Ryzen 7 1800x Memory : Test Kit Video Card : MSI 980Ti Lightning Motherboard : ASUS RoG STRIX X370-F Gaming Cooling : Noctua U12S SSD : 1x Intel 750 1.2TB NVMe SSD Power Supply : Corsair AX860i Monitor : Dell U2714H OS : Windows 7 Ultimate x64 Ballistix Elite 3466 - Overclocking Ballistix Elite 3466 - Overclocking Let’s start with the most obvious fact that these results prove. Samsung B-Die based RAM is pure Ryzen Ram overclocking nirvana. This is actually the most critical factor when looking at RAM for your shiny new Ryzen rig. It is just that good. Next since A.G.E.S.A. 1.0.0.6a was released RAM overclocking on Ryzen is not that bad. It’s still not as good as on Intel but we honestly doubt many will care about ‘only’ hitting DDR4-3466 speeds. That is bloody fast. Now with that taken care of the Ballistix Elite series is simply fan-frickin’-tastic. If you can afford it and you want 32GB of RAM it really is one of the few we would trust in our rigs. This is because these bad boys allowed us to use 4 sticks of DDR4 at 1T command rate instead of 2T. This may not sound like a big deal but it is a massive difference when it comes to latency. With the DDR4-3466 kit we were easily able to do 1T all the way to DDR4-3200 at 1.35v. To hit DDR4-3466 we had to raise the voltage a smidge to 1.40v. If our Ryzen’s IMC was better would probably could have gone even further but DDR4-3466 is our chips limit. In other words, these sticks will not be the bottleneck. It will be your processor that keeps you from going even higher. That is just amazing and underscores how good this kit really is. Next, the extra thick heatsinks really do a fantastic job at keep the RAM ICs cool without making them overly tall. Even on an open test bench and at DDR4-3466 with 1.4volts and stressing them for days at a time they only got slightly warm to the touch. Yes the single Noctua heatsink cooler sucking – not pushing – air over them was more than enough. That is not something we would recommend doing with the Tactical series. Now for those interested in tighter timings at lower frequencies the Elite series really does not offer much more than Tactical line. We got all the way to DDR4-2666 at 1.2v and by pushing this to 1.35 were able to hit DDR-2666 at 13-14-14 timings. Only then did we have to loosen things up a smidge. This is basically the same as what the Tactical DDR4-3000 kit was capable of. Albeit at 1T instead of 2T timings and with less voltage required to hit higher frequencies. Specifically to hit DDR4-3200 it only required 1.35v instead of requiring 1.40v. With 1.4v DDR4-3466 was not only possible at 2T (unlike the Tactical review sample) it was able to do it at 1T. As such if you really don’t care about Infinity Fabric speeds and rather tight (for Ryzen) timings the Elite may not be worth the extra cost. Though this will only enter into the equation for a rather small minority of people. If you don’t know if you need tighter timings vs higher frequencies… it is safe bet that you will want higher frequencies. The overall performance impact is just too large for most scenarios to sacrifice Data Fabric/Infinity Fabric performance for slightly lower latency. Mix in the fact that these go all the way to DDR4-3466 at tight timings and for those interested in getting every last ounce of performance from their CPU and RAM combination the Elite series is indeed worth the extra cost. Ballistix Elite 3466 - Adobe Testing Adobe Photoshop CC 2017 Adobe Photoshop is a raster graphics editor developed and published by Adobe Systems for macOS and Windows. To further make loading slower we have included a bunch of extra brushes that need to be loaded before the program is ready to use. Adobe Premiere Elements 2015 Adobe Premiere Elements is a video editing software published by Adobe Systems. It is a scaled-down version of Adobe Premiere Pro and is tailored to novice editors and consumers. The entry screen offers clip organization, editing and auto-movie generation options. To stress the CPU we have disabled GPU rendering and instead Premier will use the CPU only. Ballistix Elite 3466 - CINEBENCH GeekBench POV-Ray CINEBENCH R15 CINEBENCH is a real-world cross platform test suite that evaluates your computer's performance capabilities. CINEBENCH is based on MAXON's award-winning animation software CINEMA 4D, which is used extensively by studios and production houses worldwide for 3D content creation. GeekBench Benchmark Geekbench is a cross-platform processor benchmark, with a scoring system that separates single-core and multi-core performance, and workloads that simulate real-world scenarios POV-Ray Benchmark The Persistence of Vision Ray Tracer, or POV-Ray, is a ray tracing program which generates images from a text-based scene description, and is available for a variety of computer platforms. Ballistix Elite 3466 - AC Syndicate, BF4, Crysis 3, GTA V, Metro Assassins Creed: Syndicate Gaming Benchmark Assassins Creed: Syndicate is an historical action-adventure video game, published by Ubisoft and released in October 2015. Like Battlefield 4 this games does not include an in-game benchmark. This makes it perfect for more real world gaming testing. To obtain repeatable results we have used FRAPs and recorded a custom run through Thames River section starting on St. Pual's Pier. An average of four runs was taken. The settings used in the testing below are stock highest settings for quality, VSync disabled and a resolution of 1920x1080. Battlefield 4 Battlefield 4 is first person shooter video game, published by EA Digital Illusions CE and released in October 2013. Unlike most, this games does not include an in-game benchmark. This makes it perfect for more real world gaming tests. To obtain repeatable results we have used FRAPs and recorded the first 90 seconds of the single player Tashgar level. An average of four runs was taken. The settings used in the testing below are Ultra pre-set for quality, with VSync disabled and a resolution of 1920x1080. Crysis 3 Gaming Benchmark Crysis 3 is a first person shooter video game, published by Electronic Arts and released in February 2013. While older than some of the others it is one of the most visually stunning games released to date and puts a lot of demands on the GPU. This makes it perfect for more real world gaming testing. To obtain repeatable results we have used FRAPs and recorded 90 seconds of the single player ‘Post Human' level, starting as soon as soon as prophet is handed a Hammer II pistol by Psycho. An average of four runs was taken. The settings used in the testing below are highest settings for quality, VSync disabled and a resolution of 1920x1080. Texture Quality, Game Effects, Objects, Particles, Post Processing, Shadows, Shading, Water, and System Specs all set to Very High. Motion Blur was set to High and Lens Flare was set to On. Anti-Aliasing was set to MSAA 8X and Antistrophic Filtering was set to 16x. Grand Theft Auto 5 Gaming Benchmark GTA V is an open world action-adventure video game published by Rockstar Games and released in April 2014 for the PC. The game has a benchmark component to it that mimics game play and an average of four runs was taken. The settings used in the testing below are stock 'very high' settings for quality, VSync disabled and AA set to off, with a resolution of 1920x1080. Metro: Last Light Gaming Benchmark Metro: Last Light is a DX11 first-person shooter video game developed by Ukrainian studio 4A Games and published by Deep Silver released in May 2013. The game is set in a post-apocalyptic world and features action-oriented gameplay. The game has a benchmark component to it that mimics game play. Scene D6 was used and an average of four runs was taken. The settings used in the testing below are Very High for quality and a resolution of 1920x1080. DirectX 11 is used, texture filtering is set to AF 16X, motion blur is normal, SSA turned on and tessellation is set to high. Ballistix Elite 3466 - winRAR and x264 HD winRAR Benchmark WinRAR is a popular file compression and decompression tool that also happens to be multi-threaded application. While it does have a built in benchmark we have opted to use a custom 5GB test consisting of small, medium, and moderately large files. We then time how long it takes to compress the files into one .rar file with all WinRAR settings left at their defaults. x264 HD Benchmark x264 HD Benchmark is a benchmark that allows you to measure how fast your PC can encode a 1080p video clip into a high quality x264 video file. It allows for an easy comparison because everyone running it will use the same video clip and software. The x264 video encoder has a fairly accurate internal benchmark (in frames per second) for each pass of the video encode and it also uses multi-core processors very efficiently. All these factors make the x264 HD Benchmark an ideal tool in comparing the video encoding performance of different processors and systems. Ballistix Elite 3466 - Score Card and Summary Performance: 40 out of 40. The Elite series really is all about performance and here is where it excels at. Honestly, if price is not a concern this kit really does offer the best of both worlds: great performance and great capacity. What more could you ask for?! Ease of Use: 20 out of 20 While you will need to push 1.35v to get the factory rated speeds this kit is perfectly fine at booting up at lower frequencies with only 1.2v. What this means is that is incredibly user-friendly with no hand holding needed during installation and setup. Mix in practical height heatspreaders and the same is true with cooler vs RAM compatibility issues. Ballistix really has ease of use down pat on all their lines. Build Quality & Warranty: 19 out of 20 These kits are indeed built to an incredibly high standard. They also come with a lifetime warranty as such the only area that we can nit-pick at is in the aesthetics department. With only one color to choose from we do have to ding Ballistix a single point. If you don’t care about a lack of options you can consider this kit a perfect 20 out of 20 as this is the only issue worth noting in this regards. Value: 17 out of 20 While it is indeed true this kit is actually cheaper than many of its counterparts, and it does indeed justify its asking price nicely, the fact still remains that they are on the costly side of the spectrum. Mix in the fact that the less expensive Tactical series is no slouch in the performance department and the Elites relative value does suffer somewhat. It is still very good, and still will be a siren call to those who want 32GB of RAM and high frequencies… but it still is a good chunk of change to plunk down for RAM. Final Score: 96 out 100 The Ballistix Elite DDR4-3466 may cost a pretty penny but if you can afford the asking price – which is actually better than most for this class – they easily justify the cost of entry into this elite world of no compromise solutions. Ballistix Elite 3466 - Closing Statement As you can see common knowledge is not always correct. While it is true that when Ryzen was launched it did have some issues with high performance, high capacity RAM that really is no longer the case. You still have to do a bit more research than if it was an Intel based system but the chances of running into a hard wall before reaching your RAM’s specifications are a lot less likely… or at least is not as likely if you make sure the kit you are looking at is Samsung B-die based that is. As you can see this little bit of research can indeed pay off and pay off it did. The Ballistix Elite series really does live up to its name as this is the kit you want if you don’t want to make any compromises. Being able to hit DDR4-3466 with one T command rate at factory timings is as simple as entering your Ryzen based motherboard’s BIOS and plugging in the numbers. This however is only the start of your adventure. If you happen to have a rather good Ryzen CPU with an above average IMC you may indeed be able to hit DDR4-3200 speeds at 1 T instead of 2T. If you are also willing to push the voltage a little higher you can even hit DDR4-3466 speeds at 1T. The very fact you can do all that comes down to the fact that Ballistix really does pay careful attention to what components they use on the Elite line. Not any RAM module will do, and only the best of the best of the best get to be used on their Elite series. The very fact that they can do this and still be a couple dollars cheaper than the competition is not only impressive, it underscores that the fact that even the Elite series prioritizes value. Albeit relative value as the Tactical series are still one heck of a good deal for those who really don’t need to push the performance envelope. To us this combination of ease of use, performance, and yes even value, means that with the Ballistix Elite series you really can have it all. You can have the capacity you crave. The performance you desire, and even get both without breaking the bank. Color us impressed to say the least.

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