GeIL 2GB PC2-8000 Value Series

There’s not much to be said about the performance of these modules really, the results speak for themselves. This is the fastest memory I have ever tested and it looks to stay that way for a while… or at least until I get my hands on another PC2-8000 kit ;)

Corsair recently announced a PC2-8500 kit, but sadly it only comes in at 1GB, so it looks like this GeIL has nothing to really worry about. Throughout all of our benchmarks, these modules proved to be faster than any other we have tested… and by a fair margin. The humorous thing is that the modules performed better under clocked, but there are two reasons for this. The first is the tighter timings, 4-4-4 did help quite a bit compared to the stock 5-5-5. The second reason is that the FSB was higher because I could lower the memory frequency. Chances are that even this OC could be beat if I can get my FSB up to 300, and as soon as a new cooler arrives, I will be testing that out right away.

If you consider yourself to be a hardcore overclocker, these modules will love you. The ASUS P5WD2-E tops out at 2.4 VDIMM, so I was unable to attempt 4-4-4 @ DDR2-1000. Throughout the overclocking tests though, these modules seemed to love any amount of extra voltage, and a full MemTest run seemed very close to being error free at 4-4-4 with 2.4v. I could image that 2.5v or 2.6v especially may allow for 4-4-4 at stock frequency. I will test all of this in due time..

So.. are these modules worth it? If you are not an overclocker at all, and have no desire to do so, then these are the fastest modules you can buy. ‘Nuff said. If you are an overclocker, then there may be more reason to check these out because the overclocked results are nothing short of amazing. I was truly impressed with these modules and they were a blast to play with. I look forward to getting hooked up with better cooling because I’m confident that these can be pushed even further than I could currently manage.

Because of the awesome performance and great overclock ability, I award these modules a well deserved 9/10. Now for the part that hurts… the price. Currently these modules retail for around $400, but I have seen them as high as $460. This is a high price, but it’s competition is no lower. PC2-8000 is the extreme high-end and you must be ready to open that wallet wide in order to partake. That being said, it’s funny to even call these “Value Modules” because of the high price, and I am unsure why GeIL didn’t release these in their Ultra line-up because this is the only PC2-8000 kit they currently have.