Patriot's Viper Memory Sinks Its Fangs Into An Overclocking World Record At DDR5-12611

You've undoubtedly heard that records are meant to be broken, a popular phrase in the world of professional sports. That includes the sport of extreme overclocking. When it comes to DDR5 memory frequencies, we're seeing records suddenly being broken at a rapid pace, with the current speed to beat set at 6,305.8MHz, or effectively 12,611.6MT/s.

If a memory kit were to be sold at that speed, it would be labeled DDR5-12611. In reality, memory makers have yet to reach the DDR5-10000 threshold for a retail kit, let alone surpass it. The fastest memory kits you can actually buy right now are DDR5-8800, with V-Color (Mantra XFinity) and Teamgroup (Team Xtreem) both offering retail 48GB (2x24GB) kits at that speed.

It's only a matter of time before we see a retail kit at DDR5-10000 or even higher. That's due to the advent of CUDIMMs, or Clock Unbuffered Dual Inline Memory Modules. CUDIMMs have a special IC (integrated circuit) placed directly on the PCB (printed circuit board), called a clock driver (CKD) to generate the clock signal. This reduces noise and improves the signal integrity (versus having the processor handle the task), which in turn is paving the way for faster memory speeds.

CUDIMMs are also behind the rash of record-breaking overclock attempts. The newest one belongs to pro-overclocker Snakeeyes, a fitting alias, considered he achieved the record frequency using Patriot's Viper Xtreme 5 DDR5 memory.

"The unmatched design and engineering of the Viper Xtreme 5 DDR5 memory, combined with seamless hardware compatibility, enabled Snakeeyes to push boundaries consistently. This achievement underscores Patriot's dedication to delivering cutting-edge innovation and superior performance in the competitive memory market," Patriot brags in a press release.

Snakeeyes achieved the feat using ASRock's Z890 Taichi OCF motherboard with an Intel Core Ultra 7 265K Arrow Lake processor. And like the previous DDR5 records we've covered in recent weeks, setting the record required liquid nitrogen (LN2) cooling for the memory.

He actually achieved several official (and related) HWBOT accolades with this attempt, including first place in the world rankings, first place in the DDR5 SDRAM rankings, first place in the global team rankings, and first place in the DDR5 SDRAM rankings. Which brings us back to our original statement, in that records are meant to be broken. We'll see how long these current ones stand.