It used to be that getting 32GB of fast DDR4 RAM cost triple figures – but nowadays, thanks to the prevalance of DDR5 kits, getting even this amount of RAM in a competitive spec is quite affordable. This 32GB kit of Corsair Vengeance RS RGB RAM, for example, offers 3600MT/s speeds, decent CL18 timings and a price point of £67.99 after a tidy £26 discount at Amazon UK compared to its price last month.
Based on my testing of similar Corsair RGB RAM over at Eurogamer, AMD’s guidance that DDR4-3600 kits like this one make up the sweet spot for Ryzen systems is basically right on the money. DDR4-3600 represents the final stage before diminishing returns really start to set in, with great performance possible from these 3600MT/s kits at the tightest timings you can manage. These Corsair dual-channel sticks start off at CL18, but CL16 or even tighter timings ought to be possible with many CPUs depending on your motherboard and processor’s memory controller.
Even if you use these sticks at their default speed though, you should notice a nice speed-up in CPU-limited games compared to base-spec 2133MT/s or slightly faster 2400MT/s DDR4 – of the sort often equipped with early DDR4 systems! There are further gains available even if you’ve already got more common 3000MT/s or 3200MT/s RAM, but these tend to be on the smaller side – so I’d say this is only a worthwhile upgrade if you’re coming from 8GB or 16GB to 32GB – that capacity boost can be nice, especially for content creation tasks like video production.
For a brand new system, this 32GB kit also makes a good amount of sense. Pairing this RAM with a mid-range Core i3 or Core i5 processor from Intel’s 12th or 13th-gen lineups would deliver great performance in CPU-limited scenarios for a reasonable amount of investment, as would using this RAM with a Ryzen 5600 (low-end) or 5800X3D (high-end) AMD AM4 system. (You also have the option to go with a DDR5 motherboard with Ryzen 7000 and Intel 12th/13th-gen chips, but DDR4 remains the better value option according to our latest DDR4 vs DDR5 testing here at RPS).
Remember though, in most scenarios you’re likely to be GPU-limited, especially at 1440p resolution or above – so consider a GPU upgrade if you can wrangle one before you start looking at higher-grade CPUs or memory kits! If you’ve already sorted yourself out on the GPU side though, or you want to maximise performance in memory-intensive applications, this RAM kit could be just the ticket. And it looks nice too!
