DDR5 latency isn't your bottleneck.

Probably not. In competitive gaming, you’re almost always limited by the CPU or GPU, not memory latency. DDR5’s bandwidth advantage (even with higher CL) usually outweighs the slight latency penalty in most modern games.

The whole “tight timings on DDR4 beat loose DDR5” thing was more of a 2022 talking point. Benchmarks show that even CL40 DDR5 performs similarly or better than tuned DDR4 in gaming, especially at higher frame rates where bandwidth matters more. The difference you’d see in real-world FPS is single-digit percent, and often zero.

If you already have DDR4, stick with it. But if you’re building new, DDR5 is the way to go. Don’t overthink timings.

Spending hours tuning subtimings for a 2% gain is better spent on a faster GPU.