Corsair Dominator Platinum Series
Corsair has been one of the oldest
developers of overlocker-friendly memory with records since 1994. The company
has made a lot of changes in its memory module designs. Some of them were the
firsts in the industry while others were still exclusive. For instance, Corsair
was one of the first companies to use high heatsinks with a large surface area.
They were the firsts to put activity indicators on the top edge of the memory
module and the PCB as a way to remove thermal off the memory chips through
their pins. Corsair is also able to be recognized with developing memory
modules with the expanded monitoring options through software tools or
indicators of hardware. It really takes us quite long to give us the names of
all the company’s technical achievements.
The new Dominator Platinum Series can be
known as the glorious traditions. This product is worth taking notice in
implementing three original solutions:
·
Technologies help to improve the frequency
potential
·
The external design solutions
·
The ability of extra monitoring system memory
That is a
combination of three elements that make up the special Dominator Platinum
series.
First of all, let's discuss the appearance.
After all, the first thing you take notice about the Dominator Platinum is the
exterior design.
The modules look stylish and sturdy. The
manufacturers did not do their best to save the heatsinks which are made of
thick and strong black-anodized ruffled aluminum bars. Their sides are not
high, but the third heatsink at the top of each module has the ability to
dissipate the heat efficiently. Finally, the shiny frame with the engraved
Dominator logo makes it more complete and powerful.
However, the high heatsinks tend to cause
some problems. Each Dominator Platinum module is 55 mm high and 7.5 mm thick,
which makes it incompatible with large CPU coolers. We reckon that such modules
can only be installed with narrow tower-design coolers like the Thermalright
Archon or with liquid cooling solutions that have been developed commonly among
enthusiasts.
In contrast to many other products of the
same type, Corsair’s new modules are much more robust. It does not have the
delicate details inside. Instead of dual-sided thermal-conductive object, the
heatsinks are tightly secured by four screws, which make the modules almost
monolithic.
The modules have a further special feature.
The shiny frame at the top part of the module has an integrated light pipe that
stands out with two bright white LED lights on both sides. The diffused light
from them is directed downward, toward the DIMM slots, creating a beautiful
white halo in a working computer. The manufacturers have promised that they
might replace these versions together for highlighting, so modders will
probably choose from several variants.
Prominent
decorative features
Of course, the cooling system of the
Dominator Platinum combines the beauty with high efficiency. In addition to
this, the heatsinks use Corsair's Dual-path Heat X Change technology. Its
purpose is to cool DDR3 SDRAM chips and the PCB at the same time in two
different ways. Some heat is gotten rid of in the usual way with heatsinks
attached to the surface of the chips. And the remaining heat is gotten rid of
from the chips through their pins and moved to a metalized plate at the top
part of the PCB. That plate is associated with the comb-shaped heatsinks below
the steel frame. This solution ensures efficient cooling, and results in the
stable operation of the DDR3 SDRAM chips at high frequencies and heavy loads.
Cooling
system
This requirement can be easily checked in
practice, by the way: as the Dominator Platinum series is endowed with the
ability to monitor. Each module has a special connector to connect to a Corsair
Link controller. The infrastructure of Corsair Link combines hardware and
software parts that can help you monitor and adjust the parameters, the cooling
and highlight systems of your PSU. Now the system memory can be well-integrated
into it. If you have already had a Corsair Link controller (that is bought
separately), you can monitor the temperature and load level of each module Dominator
Platinum via the Corsair Link Dashboard utility.
Corsair
Link Dashboard utility
Unfortunately, the modules monitoring
Dominator Platinum are only supported via Corsair Link interface. Although each
module carries all the necessary circuits and the SPD standard supports thermal
sensors, the latter module is unable to be accessed without Corsair Link.
Corsair is just trying to promote its proprietary solutions to draw users to
separate parts of the Corsair.
The Corsair Dominator Platinum series
consists of a variety of products with different specifications: dual-channel
and quad-channel kits are rated having speed ranging from DDR3-1600 to DDR-2800
and the ability to combine 8, 16, or in some cases is 32 GB. Some kits include
an additional fan that you are able to set so that it can blow the modules from
above.
