Can Corsair dominate the competition with their flagship Platinum DDR3 memory kit? 32GB kit and lighting units tried & tested.
Product On Review: Dominator® Platinum (CMD32GX3M4A2133C9)
Manufacturer & Sponsor: Corsair
Street Price: £367.33 inc. V.A.T.
CORSAIR needs no introduction when it comes to performance memory products, their Dominator range being synonymous with overclockers worldwide. They have been leaders in innovation in the memory market for years so it should come as no surprise that they are once again pushing the boundaries in DDR performance.
Today’s review focuses on the new Platinum range, specifically the 2133MHz Quad Channel (8x4GB) kit. With Intel’s X79 slowly increasing in popularity, more and more memory manufacturers are beginning to create Quad channel memory kits, none more so than Corsair. Indeed, we use their own Vengeance kit in our test system; such is the robust and reliable performance of Corsair products. The Platinum range is an evolution of that ethos and as the precious metal name suggests, it is the result of years of research, culminating in the pinnacle of their skill to produce the kit we have for review today.
For your average Joe running an X79 machine (is there anyone who is ‘average’ running X79?), a bog standard 1866Mhz kit would suffice. Terrifically fast and taking advantage of Quad Channel memory with the additional bandwidth it provides, even standard kits for the X79 chipset are a cut above the rest. However, like with sports cars, there are hot hatches and there are cars that are a little more ‘exotic’. The Corsair Platinum kit is certainly in the latter category. Costing in excess of £350, it is aimed towards those who require the absolute best from their components without compromise.
Speed isn’t everything though. Class leading cooling, is also par for the course with this kit. Couple this with stunning aesthetics as stock but with the added option to customise the aesthetics and the Corsair Platinum kits appear to tick all the boxes which will appeal to the more exclusive among us who demand the best.
The new Corsair Dominator® Platinum builds on the legacy of the world’s most awarded high-performance memory, adding a striking new industrial design and LED lighting effects. Like all Dominator memory, they are built using only select memory ICs, highly-screened for performance and stability, and feature our patented DHX® cooling technology, so you can push them to the limit.
Dominator Platinum memory modules are assembled using a “best of the best” IC screening process. Individual ICs are hand-screened to our highest performance threshold, and then the assembled modules undergo more rounds of rigorous screening and stability testing. The result is reliable performance under extreme pressure.
Dominator Platinum memory modules are assembled using a “best of the best” IC screening process. Individual ICs are hand-screened to our highest performance threshold, and then the assembled modules undergo more rounds of rigorous screening and stability testing. The result is reliable performance under extreme pressure.
Specification & Features
Warranty: Lifetime
Size: 32GB Kit (4 x 8GB)
Performance Profile: XMP
Heat Spreader: Platinum
Memory Configuration: Quad Channel Memory
Type: DDR3
Package – Memory Pin: 240
Package – Memory Format: DIMM
Tested Voltage: 1.65v
SPD Voltage: 1.5
Speed Rating: PC3-17066 (2133MHz)
SPD Speed: 1333MHz
Tested Speed: 2133Mhz
Tested Latency: 9-11-11-31
SPD Latency: 9-9-9-24
Size: 32GB Kit (4 x 8GB)
Performance Profile: XMP
Heat Spreader: Platinum
Memory Configuration: Quad Channel Memory
Type: DDR3
Package – Memory Pin: 240
Package – Memory Format: DIMM
Tested Voltage: 1.65v
SPD Voltage: 1.5
Speed Rating: PC3-17066 (2133MHz)
SPD Speed: 1333MHz
Tested Speed: 2133Mhz
Tested Latency: 9-11-11-31
SPD Latency: 9-9-9-24
Cooler temperatures for better overclocking headroom
Excess heat limits overclocking potential, reduces performance, and can even lead to shorter component life. Our patented dual-channel DHX cooling system pulls heat away from the modules and allows Dominator Platinum to run at cooler temperatures than lesser memory kits.
This advanced cooling technology, combined with our relentless screening, delivers phenomenal overclocking potential.
Customize your look
The integrated light bar provides a subtle downwash lighting effect that gives your system an impressive look but subtle look. Additional light bars (available separately, beginning September 2012) allow you to match your system’s color scheme.
Corsair Link compatible
Add an Airflow Pro (available separately), and connect with Corsair Link system monitoring and control solutions for real-time activity and temperature monitoring
World-famous reliability and performance
There’s a reason why world-champion overclockers, extreme gaming enthusiasts and high-end system builders all trust Corsair for high-performance memory that they can install with confidence and pride. Whether you’re breaking your own records or you’re simply building a dream gaming rig, you can count on Corsair memory.
Lifetime limited warranty
Your performance investment is protected. All of our memory products are backed by a limited lifetime warranty.
The Corsair Advantage
With a long history of building enthusiast-grade memory and components, we’ve earned a reputation for quality, compatibility, and performance. Need help? We’re available by phone call, email or web forum
Packaging
If there is one area where we always feel short changed it is in the packaging department. For items that are so prone to damage it seems manufacturers are content to churn out there kits and package them in simple blister packs which offer as much protection as an umbrella in a nuclear strike. Thankfully, we see that Corsair have seen fit not only to address this issue but to go one step further.
The exterior packaging of the Corsair Platinum kit is very attractive with a matt black surface exaggerating the chrome highlights. A recessed window gives us a glimpse of the kit inside without giving the whole game away. Dominator ‘dominates’ the front of the packaging though with embossed ’32 GB’ and ‘Platinum’ text highlighted with the chrome effect.
Flipping the package over we find a very basic run down of the many features of this kit. Perhaps the most important feature here is the product sticker which gives us the code which when researched online gives us the full specification of the kit.
Breaking the sticker seal, we open the packaging booklet style which is thoughtfully held together with a Velcro tab. Again we get another glimpse of each module through the recessed windows.
Memory manufacturers take note. This is how you package memory! Each set of memory is held in place by a rigid piece of dense foam. You could throw this box against a wall (not recommended) and we doubt the modules inside this packaging would suffer any ill effects!
With the modules pressed out of the foam we find that that isn’t the end of the packaging. To protect against unwanted fingerprints and more importantly static, each module is encased in a plastic sheath.
Overall, this packaging has to be one of the best designed, most protective packaging we have seen with a memory kit which will ensure this kit arrives at its destination as good as when it left the Corsair Laboratories. Excellent start!
First Look
The modules look fantastic. Svelte matt black heatsinks are crowned with aluminium ‘light bars’ (more on this later). Each module features a sticker across the midriff with the product title (Dominator Platinum), tipped off with the memory speed rating, in our samples case, 2133MHz. The embossed Corsair logo even has a protective sliver to prevent it from being scratched during transit.
We literally cannot fault the looks of this module. If you like minimalist then this suits yet it is complex enough thanks to the hidden fins of the heatsink which hint at the performance lurking beneath the ribbed heatsink.
The rear of the module shows us everything we need to know about the kit as all of the specifications are in place. Memory size, bandwidth, latencies and voltage, even the version number is present should you wish to match this kit with one from the same batch.
The astute among you may notice that this memory kit comes with Corsair’s ‘Link’ system which will allow the fitting of and Airflow Pro module (available separately). This then connects with Corsair Link system for monitoring and control solutions for real-time activity and temperature monitoring.
Inevitably, having such a glorious heatsink means that this module will be bigger than the actual PCB which may be an issue for some, especially those who use large CPU coolers with memory sockets close to the CPU area. The good news however is that the light bar is removable which should bring the height down to a more manageable level.
The aluminium light bar is etched with the Dominator logo for the pretentious out there. No stone unturned seems to be the Corsair policy here and we like it!
With the kit installed, we can see the glow emitted from the light bar, shining down and lighting up each module with a soft, clean glow.
Optional Light Bar Upgrade Kit
Available separately is the light bar upgrade kit.
Matching the memory kit’s packaging, the light bar upgrade kits is nothing short of exceptional.
Two matching aluminium frames, a full set spare Allen key screws and Allen key along with a choice of blue and white thin plastic translucent light bars are included in each kit. 2 kits will however be required for a quad channel (x4) memory kit. A comprehensive installation leaflet is also included written in an understandable a step-by-step guide.
The original light bars are removed simply by removing the four Allen sockets. Extreme care should however be taken not to round the heads off the male/female sockets as the Allen key provided is not the best.
Here you can see the difference between the original (top) and optional (bottom) light bars. Not the missing sections of the optional light bar which allow light to shine upwards.
The plastic bars (blue or white) are inserted into the new aluminium frame easily and not as fiddly as we thought it would be. Screwing the bar back onto the module with the light bar in place was however a little troublesome as the plastic kept dropping. However, with a little persistence, the new light bar was fitted to each module.
Here you can see what the optional ‘blue’ lightbar looks like. Personally, we preferred the cleaner down light glow of the original as these are a little too ‘showy’ for our liking. It is however great to have this option available.
Test Setup
Test SystemMotherboard MSI X79 Big Bang X-Power II
CPU Intel Core i7-3960X Extreme Edition @ 3.3GHz
Power Supply ANTEC High Current Pro 1200W
Hard Drive Kingston HyperX 240GB
Cooler Corsair H100
CPU Intel Core i7-3960X Extreme Edition @ 3.3GHz
Power Supply ANTEC High Current Pro 1200W
Hard Drive Kingston HyperX 240GB
Cooler Corsair H100
Memory kits on test:
Corsair Dominator Platinum 32GB (OC) 10-11-11 2400MHz
Corsair Dominator Platinum 32GB (XMP) 9-11-11 2133MHz
Kingston HyperX 10th Anniversary 16GB 11-12-11 2133MHz
AVEXIR MPOWER 16GB 9-9-9 1600MHz
Kingston HyperX Beast 32GB 11-13-13 2133MHz
Kingston HyperX Predator 16GB 9-11-9-27 1866MHz
G.SKILL ARES 16GB 9-11-10-28 2133MHz
Patriot Division 4 Viper Extreme 16GB 9-11-9-27 1866MHz
Corsair Vengeance 16GB 9-10-9-27 1866MHz
G.SKILL RipjawsZ 16GB 9-10-9-28 1866MHz
Overclocking
Above are the SPD settings of the memory kit in today’s review.
The Corsair Dominator Platinum comes with X.M.P profiling, which ensures that should you not wish to overclock, you cna be up and running in no time at all by setting the X.M.P option in the motherboard BIOS to enabled. Once this has been done, the voltage, timings and bandwidth (motherboard dependent) will be set automatically for you.
Overclocking the Corsair Dominator Platinum was a joyous affair. It readily responded to both bandwidth and latency increases and decreases allow the user to fine tune the memory to their preference. We settled on slackening off the latency a little to give us a 2400MHz memory speed which is none too shabby at all for a 32GB kit, especially with a CAS latency of 10 clocks. We also feel there was more bandwidth to be gained however our CPU does not like baseclock adjustments so increasing the (equivalent) FSB to increase the frequency was fraught with danger and best avoided.
Still, we were very happy with the results, more so with the flexibility the memory kit afforded. If you like your overclocking then the Platinum kit should keep you busy for hours without the inherent frustration often employed by memory overclocking.
Let’s see how the results faired both in stock and overclocked formats…
SuperPI 1.5 (XS Mod)
In August 1995, the calculation of pi up to 4,294,960,000 decimal digits was succeeded by using a supercomputer at the University of Tokyo. The program was written by D.Takahashi and he collaborated with Dr. Y.Kanada at the computer center, the University of Tokyo. This record should be the current world record. ( Details is shown in the windows help. ) This record-breaking program was ported to personal computer environment such as Windows NT and Windows 95 and called Super PI. In order to calculate 33.55 million digits, it takes within 3 days with Pentium 90MHz, 40MB main memory and 340MB available storage.
HyperPI 0.99b
The HiperPI front-end is basicly a program which allows selecting multiple threads of SuperPi to be run at the same time so you can test the stability and performance on multi-core machines.
AIDA64
AIDA64 is the successor to Everest ULTIMATE. This application not only details every component within a system but it also incorporates a comprehensive memory benchmarking tool that will ascertain bandwidth and latency figures.
Sisoft Sandra 2012
SANDRA isn’t always a benchmark that is included in hardware reviews but I believe it shouldn’t be ignored. SANDRA provides a vigorous package that tests your system in a rather large array of benchmarks. There are many aspects of benchmark that can be executed. We will be considering – CPU and memory tests.
Futuremark 3DMark 11
Designed to measure your PC’s gaming performance 3DMark 11 makes extensive use of all the new features in DirectX 11 including tessellation, compute shaders and multi-threading. Trusted by gamers worldwide to give accurate and unbiased results, 3DMark 11 is the best way to consistently and reliably test DirectX 11 under game-like loads.
DiRT 3
As players race to elevate their global standing, DiRT 3 is back delivering mud, sweat and gears world over: from the intense weather-beaten rally stages of Europe, Africa and the US, to executing performance driving showcases and career challenges where car control is pushed to spectacular limits.
Conclusion
Sometimes there are products that come along which are clearly a cut above the rest. The Corsair Dominator Platinum is one such product. From the packaging to the overclocking, aesthetics to additional flexibility of adding light bar upgrades and cooling solutions compatible with Corsair Link, the Dominator Platinum is nothing short of exceptional.
The packaging is best in class and not just by a little bit – by a long, long way. Clearly a lot of thought has gone into the packaging. To make black packaging stand out from the crowd is a feat in itself but to do so with such class is inspiring. The fantastic looks don’t stop there though. We adore the aesthetics of the kit. Black, chrome and silver may sound uninspiring but as soon as you cast eyes on the kit you cannot help but be impressed.
It looks expensive and because of the weight, feels expensive. Indeed it IS expensive but for what you are getting for your money, we think it is worth it. Sure there are cheaper kits of the same speed and size available on the market but there are NONE that you will be as proud to own as this kit. If memory kits were cars then this kit would be the Aston Martin. Ultimate speed with sumptuous, timeless aesthetics. It also happens to be used by someone who goes by the name of Bond. He doesn’t settle for second best nor does he compromise and neither should you. If ever there was a product worthy of both our Elite and fittingly, our Platinum awards, then this is it. Do not hesitate; buy it now!
To summarise, the Corsair Dominator Platinum is the best of the best. It not only looks perfect, blisteringly fast at stock speed but its also so easy to get a great overclock from. Backed by Corsairs world renown lifetime warranty, you simply cannot go wrong with what has to be one of the best products we have had the pleasure of testing here at Vortez.
Pros:
+ Extreme performance
+ Sublime aesthetics
+ Excellent overclocking potential
+ Lifetime warranty
+ Optional extras available
+ Best in class packaging
Cons:
– Expensive
+ Extreme performance
+ Sublime aesthetics
+ Excellent overclocking potential
+ Lifetime warranty
+ Optional extras available
+ Best in class packaging
Cons:
– Expensive
Click here for an explanation of our awards at Vortez.net.
