This article is also available in German.


Mushkin has been well known for its high end memory modules for many years. While in the early years they concentrated on the U.S. market, nowadays Mushkin pushes hard to get a foothold also in the European market as well.  

Today we will check out the Mushkin 998681 memory kit. It consists of three modules with 2GB each, rated at 1600MHz and 8-8-8-24 timings at 1.65V. Because this kit does not support XMP for 1366, it also works well with the 1156 platform. On our AM3 board it struggled and reached only 1440MHz, but that seems to be a problem with the BIOS. Of course similar kits are sold with only 4GB in Lynnfield and AM3 flavours.



The uniqueness of this kit, it comes in a nice aluminium box which sets Mushkin apart from any other vendor. This box keeps the modules save and sound, it works fine as gift box too. Inside you find three modules.




Testbed:

Motherboard:
Intel DX58SO "Smackover" (provided by Intel)
Intel X58/iCH10R
MSI X58 Eclipse SLI (provided by MSI)
Intel X58

CPU:
Intel Core i7 920  (provided by Intel)
Intel Core i7 975XE  (provided by Intel)
Intel Core i5 750  (provided by Intel)

CPU-Cooler:
Scythe Kama Angle (provided by Scythe-Europe)

Memory:
Mushkin 6GB Kit PC3-12800 (provided by Mushkin)
1600MHz CL8-8-8-24 CR1T 1.65V

Graphics Cards:
MSI R4850-2D1G-OC (provided by MSI)

Power supply:
PC Power & Cooling Silencer 500W (provided by PC Power & Cooling)

Hard disk:
Samsung F1 1000GB (provided by Ditech)

Case fans:
SilenX iXtrema Pro 14dB(A) (provided by PC-Cooling.at)
Scythe DFS122512LS (provided by Scythe-Europe)

Case:
Cooler Master Stacker 831 Lite (provided by Cooler Master)