Micron’s next DDR5 evolution – Crucial DDR5 Pro and Pro overclocking kits review with Teardown and OC

Teardown and PCB analysis

As with most screwless DDR5 designs, the modules are dismantled in the same way: heat and lever off. A hairdryer or simply an extensive stress test brings the modules up to temperature so that the adhesive becomes more flexible and the cooler halves can be removed safely.

The Pro OC Kit has a plastic tab on top of the board between the two aluminum halves. I wouldn’t have guessed this from the outside, so the color coordination of plastic and aluminum is well done here.

While the actual RAM ICs are supplied with a long thermal pad, the PMIC is given its own, thicker and softer pad, which, according to the imprint, actually touches the PMIC. As the surrounding inductors are significantly higher than the PMIC, a very high-quality, soft thermal pad is required to achieve good contact here. Nice, especially when you consider that some other manufacturers do not cool the PMIC at all.

The heat sink halves are made of aluminum sheet with a thickness of approx. 0.6 mm. The thermal pad on the ICs is approx. 1.8 mm thick and the soft PMIC pad approx. 2.4 mm, although measuring with a caliper gauge is of course a matter of feel with such soft objects.

The structure of the non-OC modules is very similar, except that there is no plastic tab between the cooler halves and the adhesive of the foam placeholder on the back is so extremely strong that I could not easily remove it. However, as the circuit board of the Pro and Pro OC modules appears to be identical, I spared the rear from further force.

 

The thermal pads on the non OC modules are designed to be somewhat more economical. The PMIC does get a long pad that extends over the entire heat sink, but unfortunately this is not as soft as on the Pro OC modules and, judging by the imprint, unfortunately cannot touch the PMIC itself.

the heat conducting pads are 1.2 or 1.4 mm thick and make contact with the 0.6 mm thick aluminum radiator halves. As we have seen in the heatsink test, this also works well, it just doesn’t feel as high-quality as with the Pro Overclocking modules.

There is a white sticker with a QR code and two numbers on the IC side of the board. The upper number probably stands for the brand, whereby the last 4 digits are probably the production week again – this matches the sticker on the coolers – and the front part is probably the identification of the product: S802C172344 or S802C172403.

The lower number is the serial number, which we were also able to find on the cooler and in the SPD – at least this matches the Pro module. The sticker on the Pro OC module seems to have been mixed up, as E85A9E6B does not match E85D8C7A on the cooler and in the module’s SPD. Well, it’s just a small thing, but I find it funny.

The board itself also has markings in the form of a gold screen print on the back. In addition to the usual 94V-0 marking and the Underwriter Labs logo as safety certifications for the North American market, there are various other markings: “GT w 18 340 02-07”, as well as a “3616A” in black next to it. The company behind “GT” is probably Gul Technologies Singapore, which has also manufactured PCBs for Crucial in the past. 3616A is probably the PCB design revision. (Thanks Mick and previousslayer!)

After some fiberglass chips, the 8 layers of the board are revealed.

The memory ICs are where things get interesting again. The Pro OC modules use the part number D8GCD, which belongs to the product MT60B2G8RZ-60P:D according to the Micron Partnumber Decoder. Even if the data sheet for the Rev D ICs no longer appears to be public, it is likely to be a special speed bin for DDR5-6000.

The non-OC modules, on the other hand, use part number C9BPS, which the Micron Partnumber Decoder does not know how to interpret. The QR code at the bottom is also missing and instead “CPG” is printed under the Micron logo, which the ICs on the Pro OC modules do not have. It is therefore possible that the ICs here are rejects from Micron, which Crucial has packaged as its own part number with slightly lower quality. Quasi like the “Spektek” sub-brand of Micron, only that the ICs are installed by their own house brand. The “M” or “C” after the dot in the part number of the modules, which I had already discussed in the unboxing, would also fit in with this.

I have attached the latest public version of the Rev. D data sheet at the bottom of the page for you to browse through. It is interesting to note that speedbins for 6400 and 7200 Mbps are already planned.

As already identified in the SPD, the PMIC is a Richtek product with a 1.435 V VDD/VDDQ limit, labeled “0H-9G S5G” for the Pro OC module. The Pro module has “0H-9E W0T” here. Unfortunately, the markings on the PMICs are extremely faint, so that they are not even visible to the naked eye – making it difficult to see them in the photos. It should be product number RTQ5132. The SPD EEPROM is from Montage Technology Group and is labeled “STA5 307 931” or “STA5 306 741”. The part number behind this is M88SPD5118.

16gb_ddr5_sdram_dierevd