G.Skill Unveils Trident Z5 Memory Up To DDR5-6400 With CL36

Taiwanese memory manufacturer G.Skill has unveiled its flagship ranges of DDR5 memory. At release in November, 32GB kits in the Trident Z5 and Trident Z5 RGB series will be available, with a maximum speed of DDR5-6400.

Although G.Skill is mainly known for its memory for overclockers, it is striking that it initially only releases DDR5-5600, -6000 and -6400. Officially, the Intel Core 12000 processors codenamed Alder Lake only support DDR5-4800; for faster speeds you will need to enable the Intel XMP 3.0 profile.

Each speed will be available in two bins. The most expensive has timings of CL36-36-36-76, cheaper variants will be set a bit more loosely at CL40-40-40-76. In any case, the fastest bin will use Samsung chips exclusively. That manufacturer is currently responsible for the lion’s share of DDR5 production, which is one of the reasons for the high additional cost compared to DDR4.

The memory modules themselves have a new aluminum heat spreader, with accents of shiny silver or matte black. At the top, the normal Trident Z5 modules have a bar in piano lacquer, while the RGB variant naturally has a transparent LED bar there. It is controlled via G.Skills own software or via that of motherboard manufacturers.

In addition to memory chips, the DDR5 memory modules also contain a power circuit for voltage regulation, where that was a task of the motherboard up to and including DDR4. G.Skill does not give any details about this, but a validation document from Intel previously showed that modules from all manufacturers were equipped with a Renesas pmic for this. For the time being, the module makers do not seem to be able to distinguish themselves with this.

The results of a memtest with CPU-Z screenshots showing the memory clock speed and timings.

G.Skill has not yet disclosed how expensive its DDR5 kits will be. However, everything indicates that DDR5 will initially be considerably more expensive than what we are used to from DDR4. Earlier this week, a price listing for a GeIL 32GB kit appeared, which was available to order for $350.