Introduction

If you follow our SSD reviews you know we recently acquired a Lenovo W530 notebook for measuring battery life across our SSDs. The new test is so good it stuck and is now a standard test for all of our SSD reviews. Now that we have the test procedures locked down we can use the same platform to test other essential components. Most of these tests are to satisfy my own curiosity. At some point I may track down a few different mobile processors in the mobile Ivy Bridge family to see how different models affect battery life, but don't expect us to test 50 memory kits in 2013 for battery life performance.

At this time, it would be difficult to make this a regular product category anyhow. Newegg only lists two 8GB 1600MHz with ultra-low 1.35V. There are a number of 1.35V 4GB memory sticks at Newegg, but only Mushkin and Patriot have 8GB sticks available.

Our Lenovo W530 has four memory slots, but when trying to maximize battery life, lower is better. One memory stick will give you better battery life than two, three or four sticks. Our Lenovo W530 shipped with a 4GB 1600MHz 1.5V memory stick.

Can the Patriot Memory for Ultrabook double our DRAM density and still increase the battery life? We'll see today.