W541 and XMP memory

[WizardOfBoz]

So I was interested in whether the W541 would recognize and use XMP memory, as the W530 does.

I did a passmark benchmark of the system with older Samsung memory (per spec, not XMP):
Passmark: 2560, CPU Mark 7258, and memory mark 2252.
After replacing with 32Gb of Ballistix PC3-14200 (889Mhz), CPU-Z reported that two sticks of four came back as JEDEC. The other two sticks were recognized and were listed as XMP-1866. So, 888 vs 933 Mhz, about a 5% difference. Latency was higher (12 and 13) for the JEDEC slots vs the XMP (10). Memory sticks were identical, btw. The passmark score seems to reflect some difference:
Passmark: 2657, CPU Mark 7376, Memory Mark: 2518.
So about a 3% difference overall. A 1.6% increase in CPU rating, and a 12% increase in memory rating.

So, if these results are real, a very slight increase in performance. Dissapointed that (apparently) Lenovo crippled two slots, but happy that they equipped the other two for XMP.