Tech Reaction

Kingston HyperX DDR3 ‘LoVo’ OC testing

Just a quick look at a memory kit from Kingston, namely a set from their somewhat new ‘LoVo’ series. Judging by the name its a low voltage kit, so not a kit directly aimed at the enthusiast market. But word has it they might be worth a look after all!

According to their site, Kingston currently offers three versions of their ‘LoVo’ kits, 1333, 1600 and 1866 MHz. But there also seem to be an 1800 MHz kit listed at some shops, possible a replacement for the 1866 model? Either way, all share the same timings of 9-9-9-27 with recommended voltage ranging from 1.25 to 1.35v. And currently only available in 2×2 Gb dual channel kits.

The 1866 MHz kit is what I’ll mess around with today, part number is KHX1866C9D3LK2/4GX
This kit comes with two preset XMP profiles:

- Low Voltage 1866 MHz 9-9-9-27 @ 1.35v
- Ultra-Low Voltage 1600 MHz 9-9-9-27 @ 1.25v

Although for some reason the 1600 MHz profile didn’t get recognized properly. Now this could very well be a software issue on my part, but thought I’d at least give it a mention.

The sticks come with Kingston’s standard HyperX heat spreader, commonly used in a lot of their kits. But one thing is new, and that is the color!

Hardware & Software

- Gigabyte GA-MA790FXT-UD5P (BIOS f8h)
- AMD Phenom II x6 1090T
- Kingston HyperX LoVo 1866 MHz 2×2Gb (KHX1866C9D3LK2/4GX)
- ATI Radeon HD5870 1Gb
- Chieftec 1200G-DF

- Windows 7 Ultimate x64
- Prime95, Memtest, SuperPi, CPUz and Easytune

Not the most optimal platform to test high speed memory on. And low voltage testing is also out of the question as 1.6v is the lowest this board allows me to set. But ignoring that, let’s see what they can do!

These settings will all run Prime95 and Memtest for a few hours without any hiccup, so I’d call them stable.

Starting at 1.60v, 1624MHz

1.65v, 1688MHz

1.70v, 1712MHz

1.75v, 1720MHz

Voltage scaling beyond ~1.70v is pretty limited, although small gains are still there. Also, relaxing timings didn’t allow for much higher clocks, so I left those screens out on purpose.
Either way I think it’s safe to say that these sticks are capable of much higher clocks, but simply put the motherboard is holding them back. Hopefully I get a chance to test them out on a 890FX board in the near future, and I’ll be sure to post an follow up when I do.

And just for the sake of it, this is the limit for passing a SuperPI 32M run.