Performance: 30 out of 40.
Is this the fastest DDR5 kit available today? Obviously not. Is it the fastest DDR5-4800 kit available today? Nope. There are sub-40 CAS Latency kits widely available today. Does it even offer the best overclocking potential? Once again no. Does any of that really matter all that much? We think not. Instead of ‘best’ monikers what this kit does offer is offer excellent for its price range performance, excellent overclocking potential, even wide compatibility. That is a lot of reasons to like the performance it has to offer.
Ease of Use: 20 out of 20
When it comes to RAM ease of use means a couple different things. First and foremost, it means plug and play ease of use… which this kit has in spades. Plunk them into any DDR5 equipped motherboard and you can pretty much be guaranteed they will work. It can also mean ease of overclocking. Once again this kit is rather easy to use. Up the voltage to what ‘3rd party’ companies are using on their models that make use of these ICs and bam you got an excellent starting point – with all the hard work done for you by experts. It can also mean ease of overall system build. It may not sound like much but the change from ugly green to basic black makes this the easiest non-heatspreader equipped RAM we know of. Black just works well with a wide range of colors, whereas green… white… silver all have their own unique limitations. To us this makes this kit of RAM some of the easiest kits to work with we have seen in quite some time.
Build Quality & Warranty: 18 out of 20
Unlike some other manufacturers ‘value’ options this kit comes with a lifetime warranty. A warranty backstopped by a company know for both their customer service and the likelihood of them sticking around for… well… as long as RAM is being made.
Things are not quite as cut and dry on the build quality equation. On the one hand Micron is extremely conservative on their binning process so you are getting RAM ICs that are capable of much more than what they are guaranteed for. You also get a set of RAM sticks that look anything but cheap. On the other… they do lack heat spreaders. A decent heat spreader is not expensive. But by skipping the few bucks they cost, Crucial has missed a great opportunity to further differentiate their ‘value’ options from those ‘other guys’ value options. So while fantastic, and expectation exceeding, there is still room for improvement.
Value: 20 out of 20
To be blunt Crucial’s DDR5-4800 CL40 kit is the very definition of value for DDR5 RAM. That is to say… much better than it has any right to be, but still a ton of room for improvement if DDR5 is ever going to gain wide adoption. The latter really is not the fault of this kit and it has pushed the boundaries nicely. Hopefully one day we will look back and ‘go it cost HOW MUCH?! That is insane!’ until then it is an insanely good value.
Final Score: 88%
With its combination of best-in-class value; excellent overclocking potential; excellent ease of use; and even well above average aesthetics; the Crucial DDR5-4800 CL40 not only demands to be on your short list but also injects a much-needed dose of value to a marketplace that is in desperate need of as much value as it can get.
