Final thoughts and rating
Patriot's core business remains system memory. Now updated to accommodate the four modules required to support Intel's Core i7-3000 chips, the firm has used extant kits to make up these Sandy Bridge-E-supporting packs.
The best of the bunch is the Division 4 Viper Xtreme, available in 8GB (4 x 2GB) and 16GB (4 x 4GB) flavours. Outfitted with purty heatspreaders and latencies which are lower (read better) than usual, Patriot is looking to woo the gamer and enthusiast.
A 16GB pack does exactly what it says on the tin, and inputting the necessary timings and frequencies is made easy by XMP v1.3 compatibility. But, and it's a big one, the sheer amount of cache on the Core i7 3000-seriers chips means that having faster-than-normal system memory does little for real-world performance, as shown by our benchmarks.
The question then is one of whether Patriot offers value with the 16GB Viper Xtreme kit. Indications are that it will cost an additional £30 over a standard-latency offering that currently retails for £70. We're inclined to look at the Viper Xtreme as providing decidedly average value, merely because this premium is significant when compared against its peers.
Bottom line: Patriot tightens up timings but is hamstrung by the Intel chips' architecture - one that makes it difficult for memory manufacturers to offer real product differentiation.
The Good
Lovely looks and excellent construction
The Bad
SNB-E chips aren't partial to low-latency memory
Fairly large premium over generic DDR3-1,600 memory
HEXUS Rating
Patriot Division 4 Viper Extreme 16GB memory
HEXUS Where2Buy
The Patriot Division 4 Viper Extreme 16GB memory is available from Systo.co.uk.
HEXUS Right2Reply
At HEXUS, we invite the companies whose products we test to comment on our articles. If any company representatives for the products reviewed choose to respond, we'll publish their commentary here verbatim.
