Corsair hit a home run in the latter half of 2010 with the release of their Vengeance 12GB 1600mhz kit. Buyers on Newegg raved about the stability of the kit, and the ability to run the Cas9-rated sticks at Cas 8. While this is something that would not impress most RAM overclockers, it did seem to put a smile on a lot of mid- to high-level PC users. Corsair seems to want to follow up their success with the recently released 12GB 2000Mhz version of the Vengeance ram with a slight difference. This kit claims to only need 1.5v to run at their rated 2000Mhz speed. Many other 2000Mhz kits recommend 1.65v to perform this feat. Being able to run high performance RAM at lower voltage settings without giving up performance would pique the interests of almost any PC user. Today, we are going to see how well the new Vengeance kit stacks up against other 2000Mhz kits currently on the market, and if the modules can deliver competitive 2000MHz performance while only requiring less juice than the competition.

Presentation

The kit is composed of three 4GB memory sticks packaged in the familiar box format most RAM manufactures use. Each stick comes in its own hard plastic casing, instead of one large single hard plastic encasement which seems standard for many memory kits. This choice in packaging is a plus in our eyes. It adds a sense of extra care for each stick.

The sticks themselves show the rated timings, which are 10-10-10-27 2T, and the recommended DRAM voltage of 1.5v.

The modules are on a green PCB and sport the same type of aluminum heat spreaders their little brother, the Vengeance 12GB 1600mhz kit, comes in. It would have been nice, aesthetically, for the sticks be on black PCBs instead of green ones, if only to match the color scheme of the heat spreaders, but this is purely cosmetic, and has no bearing on performance.

The sticks themselves are light in weight compared to similar modules whose heat spreaders use copper, such as the G-Skill Trident or Patriot Viper. Some would form the opinion that the Vengeance heat spreaders are not sufficient to keep this sort of high performance RAM cool. The truth is, RAM modules, while some would disagree, simply do not generate enough heat during normal usage to warrant extreme heat spreaders. Extreme heat spreaders are usually needed when the RAM is being highly overclocked while being used on hours on end. That said, Corsair’s choice of spreaders with this kit is not a bad one, as these modules are not claiming to be extremely high overclockers; in addition, the lower voltage required for them will generate less heat. However, if the stock heat spreaders aren’t to your liking, rest assured that you can replace them with heat spreaders that are more to your fancy.

Next: Bench Testing & Overclocking

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