A8N32-SLI Deluxe memory trouble

[jdawg]

I just recently purchased the following

A8N32-SLI
OPTERON 170
2 - OCZ5002048ECGEGEXT-K TOTAL 4GB
2 - RAPTOR 36GB
1 - WD 300 GB SATA3
2 - EVGA SUPERCLOCKED 7900GT
SILVERSTONE 650 WATT PSU
WINDOWS XP 64

I PUT EVERYTHING TOGETHER AND COULD NOT GET IT TO RUN STABLE. I FINALLY DETERMINED THAT IT WAS THE MEMORY. I REMOVED TWO STICK OF MEMORY AND IT RAN PERFECT AND STILL DOES. I TESTED BOTH GROUPS OF MEMORY AND THEY ARE FINE. THE BOTH RUN STABLE AND FAST.

ANY IDEA WHY I CAN NOT HAVE 4 GB OF SYSTEM MEMORY INSTALLED WITH THIS BOARD?

I KNOW 2 GB OF MEMORY IS GOOD TO TODAY'S STANDARDS, BUT I ALREADY HAVE THE OTHER 2 GB AND WANT TO BE ABLE TO USE THEM ALL! :?:

 

[smedlin]

You ran memtest on the sticks?

I wonder if it could be the board itself. Something could be wrong with that 3rd and/or 4th slot. That might explain why it's fine with 2 sticks, but not 4, since those slots are used ONLY for the 3 and 4 sticks.

Hmm..try taking the 4th stick out and seeing how it runs (yes, i know, lose ddr, but it's just for testing).

 

[drkspidr]

Doesn't the manual say something about installing less then 3gb of ram?

Oops, nvm, I just went and reread what you wrote, and I can now tell you exactly what the problem is.

The autodetect of your RAM is setting the RAM speed to DDR500. Unfortunatley, it does this without upping the RAM voltage, causing instability. Manually go in and lower the RAM speed to DDR400 and this will solve your instability problems. This is just to start so that you can get it stable, you will want to check your overclockability later.

Go into the BIOS.
Go to the ADVANCED tab.
Select CPU CONFIGURATION
Select MEMORY SETTING
(This is where it will tell you what it has autodetected, which will probably be a memory clock of 250)
Select MEMORY CONFIGURATION
Set MEMCLOCK MODE to LIMIT
And select the clock speed of 200MHZ

Try that for Stability. Since you are installing 4 memory sticks, you may actually have to set the divider even lower to 166MHZ for DDR333.

Dark Spider

 

[jdawg]

I will try this tonight.

Thanks

 

[swifty_morgan]

Enable memory hole in bios, see if it will see 3.5. Mine now sees all 4gigs after some futzin, but memory is at 133 I think........ 4gigs from the desktop too. After you enable hole, put memory on auto and see what happens before you start setting timings up manually.

 

[jdawg]

But if I lower the memory to 133 doesn't that really affect the performance. I was wanting to OC the system. Did you OC yours with memory settings at 133

 

[swifty_morgan]

I'm not exactly sure if that is the correct timing or not. I have three machines at the house, and they are all different. After enabling memory hole, set memory to auto and see what happens. You can then go in and do a manual setup. I'm not going to start up the machine just to check the timings and shut it off again. 4gig is seen, and is usable on this board.........ocz platinum anyways. Work at it a little. Took me about three days to get it right and have the machine running fast.

 

[jdawg]

I'll give a try!

Thanks

 

[drkspidr]

Generally speaking, having 4 sticks of RAM will make you perform at DDR333. But with some tweaking, you might make DDR400, especially with an Opteron.

Although with your setup, I would recommend running with 2GB of RAM instead of the 4.

I'd be willing to bet that you actually take a performance hit with the additional 2 gb.

As long as you have enough memory so that your computer doesnt have to access the page file, you will increase your performance, and that is all you need, having any additional RAM will actually stress the on CPU memory controller, which is why it may not get above DDR333.

As with the above poster saying he is running at 133, that is DDR266, or roughly half the speed your RAM is rated at.

With 2 sticks of ram at 2GB, and a little tweaking of the ram voltage, you should be able to achieve DDR500, which is what your RAM is rated at.

And furthermore, since you have Raptors the performance hit of accessing the page file would not be as extreme as if you had a slower hard drive.

Really, just making a recommendation from experience, I personally would just stick with 2GB.

And the really nice thing is, since you have RAM that is rated at DDR500 with an Opteron 170, overclocking is very simple.

Opty 170 cpu Multiplier = 10
FSB multiplier = 5
FSB Speed = 200

Drop the FSB multiplier to 4 and up the FSB speed to 250 and you have overclocked your CPU by 25% and upped your ram to DDR500.

*Warning, there is no guarantee that this will work on your particular system, and you must play around with the voltages to get this to work.

Also, I couldn't find your part number for the RAM on the OCZ website but it might be this http://www.ocztechnology.com/products/memory/ocz_el_ddr_pc_4000_gold_gx_xtc_2gb_dual_channel and if so, it has your ram timings and voltage (which is what you are looking for).

You set the DDR voltage under the BIOS in the ADVANCED tab, under JUMPERFREE CONFIGURATION, and then select DDR VCORE and manually set this to your RAMS voltage rating. (the above listed is 2.75, but like I said, this does not match your part number)

Dark Spider

 

[_Cosmin_]

I think that is an AMD limitation. The integrated memory controller has problems running 4 sticks of memory in dual channel. Search for other posts about this