1600MHz DDR3 vs DDR2 memory

The fact that Intel chipsets officially support only 1333MHz DDR3 SDRAM with 7-7-7 timings is no stopper for those memory makers who are used to being ahead of the industry standards. If you are following the news, you should know that the leading manufacturers of overclocker memory modules are already shipping DDR3-1600 SDRAM to the market and get ready to start selling DDR3-1800 SDRAM. These high frequencies became available thanks to Micron’s efforts and beginning of Z9 chips manufacturing. The Z9 chips continue the good tradition set by overclocker-friendly DDR2 Micron D9 chips that can hit frequencies far beyond the nominal after careful selection and voltage increase. Although Micron Z9 chips are nominally only DDR3-1066, they were the ones that allowed raising the actual DDR3 SDRAM frequencies to a totally new level. This certainly gives progressive users some hope that DDR3 SDRAM will finally be able to outperform the good old DDR2 SDRAM in real applications.