Thermaltake might be the last name that comes to our mind while shopping for memory. However, now is a time that every manufacturer is making everything, and following the same suite, Thermaltake also brought in some quite nice memory kits into their product stack. The one’s we will be checking out, however, wont be full off RGB Bling, rather it brings out the old school elegance of Aluminum heat spreaders with elegant shades.
Thermaltake got into the memory business in the recent years. They have quite extensive lineup from what we can see on their website. We have the TOUGHRAM which is the mainstream kit coming in both RGB and Non RGB version. Then there is the TOUGHRAM RC which is their high speed offering for the enthusiasts which is compatible with their own FLOE 240 AIO. And last but not least we have the TOUGHRAM Z-ONE which is what we have on the bench today.
So without further ado, lets get into it.
The kit we will be checking out today is the Thermaltake ToughRam Z One DDR4 3200 MHz CL 16 16GB Kit(P/N: R010D408GX2-3200C16A). So from the outset, we see its an 8GBx2 kit. The embedded XMP profile delivers CAS 16 timings at 3200MHZ speed. The profile boots to 16-18-18-38 2T at 1.35V with a command rate of 1T in AMD systems.
Packaging and Showcase
The Toughram Z One kit comes in a standard matt black package with the usual plethora of information all around it. Not much to home write about but it conveys the essential information to the buyer.
The kit comes with brushed aluminum heat spreaders wrapped around a black 10 layer PCB. The top of the heat spreaders has a nice steel accent to it while the rest is kept black to keep up the appearance.
Now coming to the picture that matters most, the Thaiphoon Burner Screenshot!
What we find here is the kit is made of DDR4 2666 MHZ Down-binned IC’s made by Hynix. The part number is H5AN8G8NCJR-VKC. These are commonly called “Hynix CJR” kits. There is also a thermal sensor for monitoring temperature. Thermaltake provides a TOUGHRAM software for checking memory module temps and setting up alerts in case things get a bit out of hand, but during our usage, the software was a bit of hit or miss. We assume that the software will be more refined in the future and provide a better experience.
Test System
| TechARX Test System | |
|---|---|
| Processor | Ryzen R5 1600 |
| Motherboards | Asus Strix B350 F |
| Memory | Thermaltake TOUGHRAM Z ONE 3200MHz C16 |
| Graphics Card | Zotac GTX 1060 6GB Mini |
| Storage | Sabrent Rocket Q 1TB courtesy Sabrent USA |
| Power Supply | CoolerMaster V1000 |
Benchmarks
We ran the kit through a shorter version of our CPU Benchmark suite to showcase the memory performance explicitly. The OC results were surprising and refreshing, we got the kit to as low as 3200MHz C13 @1.45v but going up the system started misbehaving with us so we stopped.
The only other 16GB kit we had with us was the HyperX Fury RGB 3466 C16 Kit, so while its not really an apples to apples comparison, you can get a rough idea as to how it stands against the other offerings with the same parameters.
AIDA64
AIDA64 is an award-winning system monitoring and stability testing tool
AIDA64 implements a set of 64-bit benchmarks to measure how fast the computer performs various data processing tasks and mathematical calculations. Multi-threaded memory and cache benchmarks are available to analyze system RAM bandwidth and latency. Four our review we used the Memory subsystem benchmark.
7Zip Benchmark
This is a test of 7-Zip using p7zip with its integrated benchmark feature. The benchmark is sensitive to memory optimization which is why we used it here.
Conclusion
When it comes to memories, performance always takes the front seat with aesthetics coming second. With new platforms being more or less adaptable to good memories, it is natural that there is a demand and naturally everybody wants a piece of that market. Thermaltake is a new entrant in the memory market; as such it is hard to glorify them or discount them fully before they mature as a memory manufacturer. Thermaltake ToughRam Z One 3200 Mhz 16GB Kit ticks all the boxes for a good memory kit. The kit easy on the eye and overall provides a pretty decent aesthetic package to the end-user. Overclocker or just normal user, everyone will find this kit interesting and visually pleasing. A must buy if you are looking for some no-frills stick for overclocking.
A silver from TechARX
