Visiting Corsair’s Headquarter
by Christoph Katzer on January 16, 2009 12:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
I recently visited Corsair's HQ in Fremont, California. Corsair is mostly famous for its memory, but since the company entered the power supply market, it has grown strong there as well. Since I am the power supply guy at AnandTech, I was mostly interested in that area, which is why I met up with George Makris and Robert Pearce. George is in charge of power supplies at Corsair together with the very talented Padma who has designed power supplies for over 20 years now. We visited the facility with its R&D department for power supplies and memory and their huge testing area where all of the memory gets sorted. There is also still a small production line in Fremont where we could see the production of some memory modules.
Corsair has some thermal chambers in a testing room that are used for systems and power supplies alike. There is a Chroma 8000 in that room too, which enables Corsair to rate their power supplies at 50°C as stated on most of their labels. There is a large R&D department as well. Here we found shiploads of the latest hardware, like i7 systems with endless amounts of the latest graphics cards. There are other new products as well that Corsair will be bringing to market very soon, but they've asked us not to show those right now.
Corsair will be using these new heatspreaders for some of their upcoming memory modules.
Most of the production for computer components is done in Asia nowadays, and Corsair is no different. However, one difference is that according to Corsair, they are testing 100% of the first batches of power supplies rather than a smaller percentage. We also had a look at the old memory production facility, where today only one line survives to produce a very small amount of ram. To attach the heatspreaders to the memory, companies like Corsair make use of frames that can hold up to five memory modules. In this way they know all of the heatspreaders will always have the same position on the memory since the heatspreader is the only part that still needs manual work. The aluminum plate receives two lines of special glue that will melt under heat later once attached to the memory modules. Once the heatspreader is attached to the module it just receives a final sticker and it's done!
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Mr Roboto - Monday, January 26, 2009 - link
I used to really like corsair. I have only owned their memory products before. I never had any problems up until recently. I own two 2GB 8500C5D kits. They were the Micron D9GMH and like most D9's they have a short lifespan, especially when overclocked. Even then they lasted about two years being that they were factory overclocked to 1066Mhz.Anyways long story short Corsair says they can't carry them anymore because of lack of stock while other companies continue to carry them, though this is not what gets me upset. So when I send them in they keep sending out a different revision. They break I send them back and keep getting another revision. The performance and quality keeps going down in the process too.
So I sent the kit back and received some cheap ass set that barely hit 1066 and then they die after a month or two. I send them back and get another revision. This last time one of the sticks were totally dead before I even installed them.
Also the only time you will get qualtiy memory from them is if you buy the $499 2GB kits. Otherwise they sell garbage memory at a premium simply living off the once great Corsair name. While other companies continue to offer name brand quality memory at half the price, Corsair continues "updating" their IC's using crap Qimonda and garbage Samsung RAM modules.
Some say their rebranded power supplies are great, I would expect them to go the same way as their RAM. Eventually you will have to pay $299 for a 750w PSU if you want it to last. They will keep lowering the quality of parts they buy until people start to figure it out.
I understand stocks change and revisions are a must but don't sell me a Porsche and when it needs repairs fix it using old Ford parts. I paid $300 for 4GB of RAM that now won't even last 3 months. I've since bought some OCZ memory for very cheap and it's been flawless as well as overclocking nicely. The Corsair stuff struggled to even run at stock speeds without problems.
Corsair is not the same company I once knew and loved.
adfafjkafjfkajd - Tuesday, January 20, 2009 - link
I had a Nautilus 500 go bad twice and they were anything but helpful. They finally acknowledged that the units were bad and offered me a free usb memory stick for my expenses and trouble. What a joke. I had sent the unit back and forth to Corsair at my own expense, was lied to by the lady in charge of the support group, and my computer (which I can barely live without lol) was down for two months. My experience with them was horrible. I guess if you send them a memory chip or something they'll send you a new one with no hassle, but then again, so will everyone else.Einy0 - Tuesday, January 20, 2009 - link
Man I wanna work there it looks like heaven. Corsair rules, best memory products hands down. Best support I've ever dealt with hands down.yacoub - Saturday, January 17, 2009 - link
"We also had a look at the old memory production facility, where today only one line survives to produce a very small amount of ram. "It's not their current production line except for one small amount of RAM. No wonder it looks old school - IT IS.
KIAman - Friday, January 16, 2009 - link
What the heck is that brown stuff to the left of the heatspreader press. It looks like someone spilled soda on the table.Jynx980 - Friday, January 16, 2009 - link
I noticed that too. Looks exactly like a freshly knocked over can of pepsi. It also looks metallic. Whatever it is, it's permanently attached to the table.This is one of the shortest articles I have ever read on Anandtech. Is there more to come or was it just a quick visit?
Christoph Katzer - Friday, January 16, 2009 - link
It's glue. Yeah I mean it's not an indepth article about the company Corsair. I was visiting there and thought people would enjoy the pics I took...bryanW1995 - Friday, January 16, 2009 - link
lay off him, it's just a blog post.Christopher, I think that it would be very cool for you to write a longer article about your visit. Corsair has a good reputation in the high tech community.
UNHchabo - Friday, January 16, 2009 - link
Looks like more of a resin or glue to me. On the left side it looks like it's more conical, like an icicle shape.Holly - Friday, January 16, 2009 - link
Damn man, I really envy you the visit there.According to Corsair, I have recently upgraded my machine with 4GB TwinX and when I opened the package, one of the modules fell apart. Unfortunately the graphic chips were more attached to heatsink than the circuit. The support was hillarious, I had new set within 24hrs. I've got memory, PSU and flash disk Corsairs and in all 3 cases it was well worth investment.
Keep up the good work, corsairs :-)