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Last month reviewed 4Gb kits from Elixir. We thought they offer extremely good value for money, especially when the modules were rated at DDR3-1333 PC3-10600, and produced decent performance in our tests. Although they did not come any heatspeaders or any special features for overclocking, the modules were aimed at the mainstream market for users wishing to increase the size of the size of their DDR3 ram. 

Believe it or not, the enthusiast market is growing, and many manufacturers are finding it hard to ignore this potentially lucrative but competitive market. With this in mind, Elixir have decided to introduce some of their memory products into this enthusiast market. Here's a brief introduction about Elixir. Elixir is the retail brand name for their parent company Nanya. They are one of the largest producers of memory ICs and DRAM products in the world. Here's a little blurb taken from their website ...

"Elixir was debuted in late 2001 by Nanya Technology Corporation and soon emerged as the leading brand of high-performance dynamic random access memory (DRAM) products in the retail market. As part of Nanya’s marketing strategy, Elixir aims to deliver the perfect DRAM for memory-hungry computer users all over the world through Nanya’s global sales offices in USA, Europe, Japan and China. Since the introduction of industry-leading DDR and DDR2 memory products, Elixir continues to provide the world's most advanced memory solution for enthusiasts of Elixir DDR3. Elixir DDR3 is an evolution of DDR and DDR2 memory technology with higher speeds and lower power consumption."

So how did Elixir approach this enthusiast market? Well, it's more difficult than you could imagine. Big brand names like Corsair, Kingston, OCZ, Patriot, SuperTalent and many more, already dominate this very competitive market. So it's extremely difficult for any manufacturer to try and introduce their new memory products. One way of getting a slice of the pie, is with the help of a larger parent company, which Elixir is subsiduary of. With this backing, you can at least be sure that their modules are made with good memory ICs, should overclock well and offer good value for money.

In this review, we will be taking a look at the Elixir DDR3-1600 PC3-12800 4Gb kit. These modules are aimed at the enthusiasts and the higher-end of the consumer market. Rated at DDR3-1600 PC3-12800, they can run at speeds of upto 800Mhz. The modules come in the form of 2 x 2Gb sticks, with memory ICs on both sides. They come with golden heatspreaders, rather like the ones you'll find on the Crucial Ballistix modules, and help give the modules sufficient cooling.

I'm very interested in how these modules will perform and how well they will overclock. If Elixir is to become successful in this highly competitive enthusiast market, their modules must be able to perform and overclock as well as the more dominant brands. Let's find out.

The labelling and classification of DDR3 memory can be a little confusing at times, but I'll try and give you some DDR3 terminology ... More information can be found HERE

 - PC3-6400 : DDR3-800 : 200FSB : 400Mhz (800Mhz)
 - PC3-8500 : DDR3-1066 : 266FSB : 533Mhz (1066Mhz)
 - PC3-10666 : DDR3-1333 : 333FSB : 667Mhz (1333Mhz)
 - PC3-12800 : DDR3-1600 : 400FSB : 800Mhz (1600Mhz)
 - PC3-14400 : DDR3-1800 : 450FSB : 900Mhz (1800Mhz)
 - PC3-16000 : DDR3-2000 : 500FSB : 1000Mhz (2000Mhz)

In our tests we'll be installing these modules on an Asus P5E3 Deluxe motherboard, along with our trusted old Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 (B3 stepping) processor and a Radeon HD 4850 512Mb DDR3 graphics card, PC Power & Cooling 860W PSU, running Windows Vista. During the tests, we'll see how they perform against other DDR3 modules on the market .

OK, let's not waste any more time and take a closer look at Elixir's DDR3-1600 PC3-12800 4Gb kit (with headspreaders ...