Crucial Ballistix 2GB PC2-8500

INTRODUCTION

There's never been a better time then now to be in the market to buy a kit of high performance DDR2 RAM. Unless you have been hiding under the proverbial rock it has been hard to miss that prices of high-end DDR2 RAM have not just fallen, they've simply collapsed. Kits priced at over $300 (such as the RAM in this review) can now be had for just a third of the price, and some very good but not quite as fast kits can be had for even less than that.

For those curious to know the current price situation is from a strong oversupply of memory chips coordinated with somewhat lower than anticipated demand, which has created the current abundance of mail-in-rebates and price slashing that can be found in general. Word is that some memory manufacturers are now cutting production rather than risk taking losses. Prices are currently as low as they can go and should actually climb a little once the supply situation stabilizes, so don’t wait to long if looking for that new kit of RAM!

So with that in mind today we will take a look at the Crucial Ballistix DDR2 1067MHz (PC2-8500) 2 x 1GB memory kit. During this review the price on this kit indeed did drop by roughly 66%, making it a veritable steal at just $119 after MIR at some online merchants.

Crucial: The Company 

Crucial Technology is of course the brand name extension of Micron Technology, the company that not only designs and builds the actual memory chips and the PCBs they go on but also whose latest call to fame has been the Micron D9 series of chips. After being a long time company that served the value and mission critical memory markets with their ultra dependable RAM, Crucial was one of the first to introduce high-performance RAM to the DDR2 market under their Ballistix name.

Recently they have quietly slipped back out of the limelight as Corsair and OCZ surged ahead with their neverending duel to out-clock each other, with 1300MHz and still higher clocked DDR2 modules now becoming a reality. Micron is currently working on developing the first native DDR2 1067MHz speed grade memory, as currently any RAM rated above 800MHz is in actuality just overclocked 800MHz RAM!

The Crucial story starts with Micron Technology, Inc., one of the largest dynamic random access memory (DRAM) manufacturers in the world and the only one based in the U.S. Headquartered in Boise, Idaho, Micron manufactures DRAM chips and assembles them into high-quality memory modules for sale to original equipment manufacturers ("OEMs") worldwide.

For nearly three decades, Micron has learned that when you make some of the very best memory in the world, lots of companies want it, from computer makers to wireless device manufacturers to printer producers. (And we're really glad that they do!)

But then Micron asked, well, what about the end user? What about the everyday folks who want to upgrade their existing systems with OEM-quality memory — the home desktop user, the IT network guy, the student notebook user? Why don't we offer our memory to the public, at factory-direct pricing?

So in 1996, Micron responded to a growing demand for high-quality memory upgrades among end users who wanted the best possible performance from their systems. Micron launched Crucial Technology in September of that year, and for the first time, end users had the opportunity to buy directly from the manufacturer the same memory modules bought by the world's major OEMs for original installation in their systems.

Having a direct sales division focused on selling Micron's DRAM to the public was apparently an idea whose time had come, and 10 successful years later, we have expanded our product line to include graphics cards, flash cards and readers, and USB flash drives.