Trying to get stable at stock settings: 8 GB Patriot DDR3 + ASUS P5E3

[Digitalfiend]

I'm kind of stumped as to how I should proceed. I've got two systems, both are nearly identical and both have 8 GB (4x2GB) of DDR3 Patriot PVS34G133LLK. The Patriot memory is supposed to run at 1333, 7-7-7-20 @ 1.7v. On slightly older but stable system, I'm able to achieve this with the DIMM voltage set to 1.78v. With the new system, I get an error from MemTest86+ v2.01 after 6 passes, on Test #8, after approximately 8 hours. This new machine will be host to a number of virtual machines, dev tools, and act as a game rig part time. I'm not interested in overclocking.

The new system:

Q9550 (C1 stepping) @ 2.83
ASUS P5E3 Premium WiFi w/0503 BIOS
Antec P182 w/one additional 120mm case fan as front (all set to HIGH speed)
8 GB (4x2GB) of Patriot Viper-series memory (PVS34G1333LLK)
750GB and 500GB Seagate HDDs
Corsair HX1000 PSU
BFG GTX 280 OC
APC RS1500 UPS

The "old" system (wife's computer):

Q9450 (C1 stepping) @ 2.66
ASUS P5E3 Premium WiFi w/0503 BIOS
Antec P182 w/one additional 120mm case fan as front (all set to HIGH speed)
8 GB (4x2GB) of Patriot Viper-series memory (PVS34G1333LLK)
2x 500GB Seagate HDDs
OCZ ModXtream 780W PSU
BFG 9800GTX OC2
APC RS1300 UPS

So far, I haven't really played with the memory timings, only DIMM and NB voltages (and only to a minor degree on the NB settings). All "auto" overclocking settings are disabled as well as spread-spectrum for the CPU and PCI. I should note that everything else appears stable, including the OS, games, and apps like 3D Vantage. That's why I was disappointed to see errors after 6 passes/8 hours. The system did crash once while I was trying to format the 2nd drive, but I was running the system with 8GB at 1.70v.

My question is how should I proceed next towards the goal of a stable system at stock speeds? I'd still like to maintain optimal performance, so which settings should I play with next? Should I try 7-7-7-24 @ 1.78v, or just increase DIMM volts to 1.8-1.82? Would playing with tRFC first be a better approach? I've read some of the guides, but I'm not sure where to start in my case.

Any suggestions or tips would be appreciated.

Thank you.

[BongWizard]

You're gonna wanna crank the northbridge voltage for the 8GB RAM. Set it up to something around 1.25-1.4V. I know the RAM says it should be 1.7V, but you might wanna try that up around 1.8-1.95V. You might also wanna increase the tRFC to something like 58-65 (because you've got 4x2gb running). I'm not really sure what the Asus BIOS looks like, but if you could post more about your settings i might be able to help a bit more.

[ANZAC_ELITE]

Welcome to my world, lol. (My specs are in my sig)

I have the P5E3 vanilla, the problem is the same with my board (and I'm not the only one btw) , it doesn't like the four DIMMs slots populated, I can run 2*1GB at 1333MHz but not 4*1GB, the best I can do is 1066MHz 7-7-7-20-1N

Your vDIMM is high, not too sure if I'd go that high (warranty concerns) but if you're not worried then I guess that's fine.

Apparently (from the Asus P5E3 forums) the DIMM slots are rated differently between A & B, with the B slots being the performance slots. It appears that the board will not run 1333MHz rated memory at 1333MHz with four DIMM slots populated. To say I'm not impressed would be an understatement.

I'm currently in "talks" with Asus Tech Support regarding this issue and would suggest you sign up as a VIP member at the Asus site by registering your board and join me in "discussion" with Asus Tech Support. (It "appears" that the P5Q3 does not suffer this problem from the Asus forum posts but I would be wary even so)

[Digitalfiend]

Is 1.8v really that high for DDR3? I know the spec states 1.5v but when I was tweaking the "old" system a tech at Patriot told me that a 0.1v increase over the recommended setting (1.7v for their DDR3) was fine.

As I said, I'm really stumped with this as the other system is running 8GB @ 1333 with 1.78v (0.08v over spec). My wife plays the Sims2 on that for hours at a time and it had been running for almost 2 months straight before I put it on a sleep-schedule (now that I've got the new system). So, I think it is possible to run 8GB@1333 with the P5E3 (X48) *but* this new system might need a little tweaking.

I'll post up the settings from my BIOS tomorrow. Thanks for the help guys - much appreciated.

[ANZAC_ELITE]

Your bios settings would be good to see.

You could try this (if you haven't already)
Transaction Booster = Disabled
Relax Level = 2 (raise to 3 if still unstable).

NB - ? (I went past 1.41v with no discernable improvement)

Have you tried Ai Clock Skew Channel A - Delay 50ps? 100ps, 150ps?
or alternatively Channel B Advance 50ps, 100ps, 150ps?

Here's an interesting point from the guy with the same problem with his 1600MHz memory on the Asus Forum

The problem is that with 4x DIMM's the manufactured rated specs sort of go out of the window (as testing and verification is only ever done with the 2 sticks in the kit)
When I had 4 sticks @ 1333Mhz even though my RAM was rated for 1.80V @ CL7 1600Mhz using 4 sticks of RAM required 1.88-1.90V and only @ 1333Mhz. This is largely due to the design of the motherboard and the traces.

My board will pass POST with the memory at 1333MHz but dies when loading into the operating system.

[markm75]

Did you ever have luck getting all 8GB stable at once?

I'm having the same issue with the Asus p5e3 deluxe board, with my OCZ 8GB ddr31600mhz ram, certainly cant boot the OS at 1600mhz, occassionaly it will glitch on 1333 (though linpack testing came out clean many times!)..

From what i'm reading as a whole on all boards.. 8GB usually means dropping down to 1066 or maybe 1200max or so..

I'd love to find someone who has run all 8GB, especially at 1600mhz on this board..

I'm thinking of dumping my OCZ 1600mhz ram in favor of 1333 corsair and maybe overclock that if i can at least first get stable at 1333..

Here is one of my threads and my issues in case anyone is interested:
DDR3 nightmares, p5e3 deluxe and linpack testing failure? - Page 2 - Overclock.net - Overclocking.net

Btw.. since you also have this board.. were you able to use the onboard controller in raid mode, plus have the jmicron esata enabled? I cant have jmicron enabled, raid wont show up and if i disable jmicron, vista reformat complains about any of the hdds not meeting its criteria to install : http://www.overclock.net/intel-mothe...ml#post4715024


Thanks

[Digitalfiend]

Sorry for not getting back to you guys earlier but work got really busy and I just hadn't had time to work on this, until today. Anyhow, I finally had a chance to spend the day at testing everything and I just wanted to give you guys an update:

I tested each individual memory stick in memory slot A1 and ran MemTest on each stick for 2 hours using test #5 (~105 passes) and then the full suite of tests for 2 hours (~10-12 passes). Each stick passed perfectly at 7-7-7-20 @ 1333MHz using DRAM volts = 1.70v.

Now that I knew the memory was likely OK, I popped all four sticks back in made the following changes to the BIOS (latest version):

- DIMM voltage: 1.78v
- TRFC: 82 (default was 60 @ 7-7-7-20/1333)
- NB voltage: 1.29v

Then I fired up MemTest and ran test #5 for 50 passes. After that I ran the full suite of tests for 7.5 hours (8 passes). At this point, I'm confident that everything is stable. The only changes I made since my first attempt was to TRFC and NorthBridge voltage.

I'll report back in a few weeks of running the system 24/7 with VMWare Workstation 6.5 (4 VMs, 512-1GB each) and normal usage (games, browsing, development, etc).

So far so good. Thanks for the suggestions.

[Digitalfiend]

Originally Posted by markm75

Did you ever have luck getting all 8GB stable at once?

Just got it stable. My wife's machine, which is virtually identical to mine except for Q9450 vs. Q9550 and 9800GTX OC2 vs. GTX280, only required me to up the DIMM voltage to 1.78 (up from Patriot's recommended 1.70). My machine on the other hand needed an increase in NB voltage and for me to relax tRFC from 60 to 82.

Originally Posted by markm75

I'm having the same issue with the Asus p5e3 deluxe board, with my OCZ 8GB ddr31600mhz ram, certainly cant boot the OS at 1600mhz, occassionaly it will glitch on 1333 (though linpack testing came out clean many times!)..

I've got a P5E3 Premium WiFi. Not sure if that matters all that much other than X48 vs X38.

Originally Posted by markm75

From what i'm reading as a whole on all boards.. 8GB usually means dropping down to 1066 or maybe 1200max or so..

I'd love to find someone who has run all 8GB, especially at 1600mhz on this board..

I've managed to get my 8GB Patriot Viper Series memory, rated at 7-7-7-20/1333, to run stable on my wife's machine and now it seems stable on my machine too.

Try playing with your NB voltage and REF Refresh (tRFC); give 1.32v and tRFC 88 a shot. Also check OCZ's forums as I believe someone from OCZ posted what settings to use to get 8GB working on a P5E3 Deluxe.

Good luck.

[Digitalfiend]

UPDATE:

Argh. I was playing a game yesterday and got a BSOD (bug check 0x1E; Access Violation) and figured I'd run Memtest again. It failed in 3 hours (previously it ran for 7.5 hrs). Sigh.

So I tried some more tweaking and eventually decided to just return my NB setting to Auto and set my memory timings a bit looser. I ended up setting my memory to 8-7-7-20 @ 1333 with 1.78v and stock NB. Memtest ran for 10hr 42min, completing 9 passes. I would seriously hope it is stable now...

[ANZAC_ELITE]

Good luck mate, I've given up, just bought a Foxconn Blackops.

As a side note:

Asus Tech Support has requested that I send (at my expense) my memory modules to them so they can test a P5E3 board with them.

Say what??