ADATA XPG Spectrix D40 16GB RGB DDR4 Memory Review

By Steven Kean

The Intel Z270 DDR4 Test System

The Intel Z270 based test system includes the following hardware:

Intel LGA 1151 Z270 Test Platform
Component Brand / Model Pricing
Motherboard ASUS Prime Z270A Click Here
Processor Intel i7-7700K Click Here
CPU Cooler Corsair H105 Click Here
Video Card eVGA GTX 970SC Click Here
M.2 Drive Kingston HyperX Predator 240GB Click Here
SSD Intel Pro 2500 180GB SSD Click Here
Power Supply Lepa G650-MAS
Operating System Windows 10-Pro 64-Bit v.1709 Click Here
ASUS Prime Z270A
ASUS Prime Z270A – CPU-Z

The ASUS Prime Z270A is running the latest BIOS from ASUS, 1203 dated December 25, 2017. The Intel i7-7700K CPU has not been overclocked for this testing, we left it at it’s default setting of 4.2GHz.

Adata Spectrix D40 RGB DDR4
Adata Spectrix D40 RGB DDR4

The ADATA XPG Spectrix D40 memory uses XMP 2.0 and includes two profiles, one running at 2666MHz and one for 3000MHz. We will be setting the memory to 3000MHz, which has default timings of 16-18-18-36 2T.

Kingston Fury 2666MHz
Kingston Fury 2666MHz
Kingston Predator 3200mhz
Kingston Predator 3200mhz

The Kingston Fury DDR4 memory is older, and runs at 2666MHz, with 15-17-17-35 2T timings, while the HyperX Predator is newer and runs with 3200MHz and 16-18-18-36 2T timings.

Overclocking the ADATA XPG Spectrix D40

To overclock the ADATA XPG Spectrix D40, we started with the default settings for 3000MHz. We began to increase the clock speed, and when it would fail, the timings would be loosened and the voltage increased.

Adata Spectrix D40 RGB DDR4

It immediately failed to post with the default settings at anything above 3000MHz. With a setting of 1.3V, the Adata Spectrix D40 was able to go to 3333MHz while keeping the default settings. Increasing the speed up to 3466MHz was obtained by adjusting the voltage to 1.35V, while still retaining the default timings. Sadly, this appears to be a hard ceiling, as even loosening the timings did not allow us to increase the speed any further. Taking the memory from a base speed of 3000MHz to 3466MHz is close to a 15.5% increase in clock speed; however the voltage had to be increased to it’s maximum in order to obtain that.