oc'ing woes

[bigbangtheory]

I have trouble trying to oc with my current rig (see below). Some have told me I need to be sure to keep fsb and ram in sync, some have said to try running ram at 100%.

I recently flashed to the latest bios phoenix 1004, and still cannot get the system to oc.

I have temps controlled well enough <40 with vantec aero and zalman heatpipe and 92mm fan. I just to pump things up a bit.

Any suggestions on what else I might try?

Thanks a bunch!

:cool:

[Woody_87th]

Same system as me except that I'm running a Barton 2500+ and have PC3200 Corsair RAM, although not as much as you only ....2x256MB.

What specs are you changing exactly? clock multiplier? Vcore? FSB? RAM timing?

Try leaving the memory to Auto and then changing everything else to get the CPU to run where you want it and then change the RAM if you need to. Best to change one thing at a time and in small steps to be sure you know what it is that's causing your grief.

[bigbangtheory]

I think you may be on to something woody...

I believe corsair designed their twinx ram to be very good in sync with cpu and asus mobo, but at STOCK speeds. I think once that fsb gets jacked up, the ram freaks out.

But also, I may be trying to mod too much at once. The only mods I do at the same time would be fsb and vcore. Otherwise, I try to reboot before an additional mod is made.

However, I find that the system just 'hangs' and I eventually have to clear cmos by unplugging/pluggin in a jumper on the mobo.

[theyneverknew]

Althouhg ur corsair RAM is only rated for DDR333 it is damn good RAM so it should be able to reach higher than rated speeds :thumb: Try loosening the timings, that may help ur oc, definitely keep ur FSB:RAM ratio at 1:1 though it gives the best performance on nforce2 boards :cheers:

[Wiggo]

Yes manually set the memory timings slower and you should then be able to get some action happenin' on the FSB but to get the best action possible from the whole setup buy some XMS3200/3500 modules and sell the current ones ya have as they'd be good paired with 133MHz FSB Athlons.

[Woody_87th]

I don't think you neccessarily need to sell those modules, they are good modules and you should at least find out what they are capable of first.

I had similar problems with my 3200 modules but got it under control now so I would suggest you looking at the other thread I made in this section titled "A7N8X and 3200 RAM best settings?" and set the same timings I just described in there. Make sure you are running the RAM in sync at stock speeds you can try upping the FSB and carefully checking things until you find not only the maximum speed the RAM will run but the maximum practical speed. No point in pushing it past the point of no performance gains since you'll be stressing your system for no good reason.

You should be able to get pretty similar performance out of those modules and well past the rated speeds.

Test your memory bandwidth as you go and let me know how it works out.

[bigbangtheory]

Thanks woody. I saw your other thread and I will try some of your settings.

Last night I actually got the fsb close to 190, keeping memory at 100% but without any tweak to the Ram's cas, ras, etc. (so I will try your suggestions on those).

Also, since your memory is (stock) 3200/200 and mine is 2700/333, I might have to settle for slightly lower fsb, as oppossed to your 200mhz?

In any event, I think I will see major changes once I follow your suggested memory timings, which I'm guessing should allow me to be stable at 190fsb.

If I can reach 190 with a multiplier of 12 = 2280mhz, or 13 = 2470mhz, it will be worthwhile (as my stock speed is 13x166=2158).

[Woody_87th]

Don't forget this is all DDR memory so the memory runs at double the motherboard bus speed. Or the same frequency as the CPU FSB. So when I set my motherboard frequency to 200 I am running my CPU FSB and RAM at 400MHz.

190MHz is not bad since you are running the RAM at 380MHz instead of the stock 366MHz. But my guess is you should be able to get 200MHz if you adjust the the timings and change the DDR voltage to 2.7.

I use an application called AIDA32 as a quick memory bandwidth benchtest to compare results. You can do a quick search on the web if you don't have it. This would help you determine what settings are giving you the best memory performance.

[bigbangtheory]

Thanks mate! I will try some tweaks tonight if I can and hopefully have some test results for you to follow.

[logixrat]

The direct link to the Aida32 program is:

http://www.aida32.hun

Good luck,
LogixRat
P-)

[bigbangtheory]

Ok. I got the rig to reach the 185-190 fsb range with limited stability. I believe I had the multiplier at 12.5 when the rig decided that it was too high.

I left my ram timings alone, as they were identical to those timings 'Woody' used when he hit 200fsb (5,2,2,2), and his rig is very similar to mine except he's got corsair 3200 while I have 2700. I pushed ram voltage up to 2.7 which seemed to help, and I believe I also pushed vcore up to maybe 1.725 or thereabouts. Ram was also set at 100%, not auto, not spd.

I think I am finding that my ceiling on this rig is about 12x185, which would be worth the performance gains.

The only other thing I can think to do would be to get higher fsb by relaxing the ram timings further. Any suggestions here, magic formulas? But I don't want them too relaxed as I might lose some performace gains that way.

[Wiggo]

Mmm... my 2600+ (2083MHz stock) is runnin' at 12.5 x 181MHz for 2.26GHz atm (but I havn't had any real time to tinker with it yet).