ASUS P5B Deluxe DDR2 installation

[wormy]

This is a simple question...and the manual doesnt seem to give a direct answer...I have 2 sticks of 512 DDR2...to use the dual channel mode...do I put them both in the yellow or 1 in the 1st yellow and 1 in the 1st black slot?

 

[srxtreme]

The first 2 slots that are close togther CPU side (1 blk 1 yellow)

It should be marked there on the board DIMM A1 A2

 

[qwazzy]

This is a simple question...and the manual doesnt seem to give a direct answer...I have 2 sticks of 512 DDR2...to use the dual channel mode...do I put them both in the yellow or 1 in the 1st yellow and 1 in the 1st black slot?

Actually it is in the manual because I have the same board. Anyway, srextreme is right.

 

[rquinn19]

This is a simple question...and the manual doesnt seem to give a direct answer...I have 2 sticks of 512 DDR2...to use the dual channel mode...do I put them both in the yellow or 1 in the 1st yellow and 1 in the 1st black slot?

Actually it is in the manual because I have the same board. Anyway, srextreme is right.

i always thought it was supposed to be 2 of the same color

edit: should i change mine? it says dual under channels in cpuz

 

[rwpritchett]

This is a simple question...and the manual doesnt seem to give a direct answer...I have 2 sticks of 512 DDR2...to use the dual channel mode...do I put them both in the yellow or 1 in the 1st yellow and 1 in the 1st black slot?

Actually it is in the manual because I have the same board. Anyway, srextreme is right.

It depends on the motherboard brand whether or not you match colors for dual channel or not. For this board, put your memory sticks in color MATCHING slots: Yellow-Yellow or Black-Black.

I have a P5B-Deluxe and it says in the manual A1:A2 are Yellow:Black and B1:B2 are Yellow:Black. This means you need to match A1 and B1 or A2 and B2 for dual channel, otherwise you are running the memory on one channel only.

I have mine on Yellow and the POST, CPU-z, and the manual say it's in dual channel mode.

 

[srxtreme]

This is a simple question...and the manual doesnt seem to give a direct answer...I have 2 sticks of 512 DDR2...to use the dual channel mode...do I put them both in the yellow or 1 in the 1st yellow and 1 in the 1st black slot?

Actually it is in the manual because I have the same board. Anyway, srxtreme is right.

It depends on the motherboard brand whether or not you match colors for dual channel or not. For this board, put your memory sticks in color MATCHING slots: Yellow-Yellow or Black-Black.

I have a P5B-Deluxe and it says in the manual A1:A2 are Yellow:Black and B1:B2 are Yellow:Black. This means you need to match A1 and B1 or A2 and B2 for dual channel, otherwise you are running the memory on one channel only.

I have mine on Yellow and the POST, CPU-z, and the manual say it's in dual channel mode.

Good question Wormy; Thanks to your question I and some others have found some more performance. Sure glad I was following this thread


Seems the manual is a bit confusing Manual stated and I quote:
Channel A = socket DIMM A1 and DIMM A2 (Yellow-Blk)
Channel B = socket DIMM B1 and DIMM B2 (Yellow-Blk)


Therefore the manual reads like you should use A1 and A2 (Channel A) as I mentioned above, but after reading this I checked CPU-Z and it says I'm in single channel mode, so I'll be switching to A1 B1 (Yellow Yellow)

Question: How am I running with my FSB at 1066 if I'm in single channel mode? Thought I needed dual channel (2X533) to obtain this speed?

I'm running the P5B Deluxe Wi/Fi , C2D E6400 and CORSAIR XMS2 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR2 800 (PC2 6400)

 

[rwpritchett]

Yes, you should have your RAM in A1 and B1 (Yellow-Yellow) then confirm on bootup or CPU-Z that you are running in dual channel mode.

The manual is confusing but trust me, match yellow-yellow or black-black for dual channel on the P5B-Deluxe/WiFi.

 

[rwpritchett]

Question: How am I running with my FSB at 1066 if I'm in single channel mode? Thought I needed dual channel (2X533) to obtain this speed?

Dual or single channel mode isn't dependant on the speed of the FSB frequency, they both run at the same speed. The difference is dual channel transfers 128-bit while single channel transfers 64-bit. Think of dual exhaust on a car. It's moving at the same rate, but twice as much is being moved due to channels being used simultaneously.

The CPU FSB is determined by the base FSB, 266MHz at stock settings, and is quad pumped for the CPU (266 x 4 = 1066) and is double pumped for DDR RAM (266 x 2 = 533). Dual channel <b>doesn't</b> mean that your RAM is running at 533 x 2 = 1066, and the speed of the RAM doesn't affect the CPU FSB. Dual channel at stock settings runs at 533MHz and transfers @ 128-bit.

 

[srxtreme]

Question: How am I running with my FSB at 1066 if I'm in single channel mode? Thought I needed dual channel (2X533) to obtain this speed?

Dual or single channel mode isn't dependant on the speed of the FSB frequency, they both run at the same speed. The difference is dual channel transfers 128-bit while single channel transfers 64-bit. Think of dual exhaust on a car. It's moving at the same rate, but twice as much is being moved due to channels being used simultaneously.

The CPU FSB is determined by the base FSB, 266MHz at stock settings, and is quad pumped for the CPU (266 x 4 = 1066) and is double pumped for DDR RAM (266 x 2 = 533). Dual channel <b>doesn't</b> mean that your RAM is running at 533 x 2 = 1066, and the speed of the RAM doesn't affect the CPU FSB. Dual channel at stock settings runs at 533MHz and transfers @ 128-bit.

Thanks for the info, it was a great help. I was a bit confused on all the multipliers. I have been doing some moderate overclocking since a 386/DX 40 was considerd fast, but haven't kept up since DDR2 came into play.

 

[Klank55]

I checked my system and it turned out I was not running in dual channel. I switched the memory around and CPUZ says its running in dual now. I have a 2 gig dual channel kit which seems to work fine I had no problems in memtest86 and I also have a 1 gig dual channel kit that when installed alone works fine and has no problems in memtest, but when I put it in the B1,B2 it only reads as 512 and my system crashes.

If I look in the bios it says that there is only 2.5gigs of ram insalled but cpuz tells me that there is 3gig total installed. Anyone know what the problem is with this?

 

[rwpritchett]

Have you tried this setup:

A1(Yellow):1GB Stick
A2(Black):512MB Stick

B1(Yellow):1GB Stick
B2(Black):512MB Stick

Match your kits with the colors- yellow or black.

 

[Klank55]

Have you tried this setup:

A1(Yellow):1GB Stick
A2(Black):512MB Stick

B1(Yellow):1GB Stick
B2(Black):512MB Stick

Match your kits with the colors- yellow or black.

Yep tried both

A1:1gig
A2:512mb

B1:1gig
B2:512mb

and

A1:512mb
A2:1gig

B1:512mb
B2:1gig

also before I knew about the having to match black with black and yellow with yellow I tried

A1:1gig
A2:1gig

B1:512mb
B2:512mb

and it still only showed as 2.5gig

 

[amnotanoobie]

Have you tried updating your mobo bios?

Or maybe one of your 512's has gone bad. Try memtesting the two 1 gigs, and the two 512's, then narrow down further if you find problems in one set.

 

[Klank55]

Have you tried updating your mobo bios?

Or maybe one of your 512's has gone bad. Try memtesting the two 1 gigs, and the two 512's, then narrow down further if you find problems in one set.

I'm running the most recent bios and have run memtest86 overnight on the 512 sticks alone and the 1gig sticks alone. This is the 2nd set of 1gig sticks that I got since the last ones were bad but these ones seem to check out. However the 1gig sticks seem to crash my system. Right now I am just running on the 512 sticks till I have enough time to figure out what is up with the 1gig ones. It seems strange that memtest would find no errors but it would crash the system.

 

[joescat]

I checked my system and it turned out I was not running in dual channel. I switched the memory around and CPUZ says its running in dual now. I have a 2 gig dual channel kit which seems to work fine I had no problems in memtest86 and I also have a 1 gig dual channel kit that when installed alone works fine and has no problems in memtest, but when I put it in the B1,B2 it only reads as 512 and my system crashes.

If I look in the bios it says that there is only 2.5gigs of ram insalled but cpuz tells me that there is 3gig total installed. Anyone know what the problem is with this?

Switched it around to where?

Maybe the manual is hinting at your problem, but as usual isn't very clear about it: "If you install four 1GB memory modules, the system may detect less than 3GB of total memory because of address space allocation for other critical functions. This limitation applies to Windows XP 32-bit version operating system since it does not support PAE (Physical Address Extention) mode." (misspellings copied verbatim).
Yeah, you didn't say you had 4 modules, but otherwise the symptoms may match?

Which leads to my hopefully related question: Will this go away with Windows Vista? Should I install XP 64-bit? I've honestly never used it, and plan to start with 2 1GB modules. Am I taking a risk finding common drivers and such by going to the 64-bit version?

 

[htredneck]

You all had me worried for a minute with this yellow yellow black black stuff. I put together a P5B board yesterday and put 2 sticks in the yellow just like I did on the P5GD2 Deluxe board I am replacing. I didn´t think anymore about it until just now. I just checked and CPU Z says I´m running dual channel.

I will be switching the Kingston 533 in a few days for 2 (1 gig) sticks of 800. Can you tell me what brand and type you used with success?

Thanks

 

[joescat]

I'll post my memory brand and model later when I have it available.

Note, if you have successfully installed your RAM in Dual Channel mode, it indicates that in the POST startup screen.

 

[srxtreme]

I'm running

CORSAIR XMS2 2GB (2 x 1GB) TWIN2X2048-6400 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Cas Latency 5 ,Timing 5-5-5-12, v1.9V

(Part# CM2X1024-6400, week 23 2006) Model #: TWIN2X2048-6400

and my E6400 2.13MHz OCed to 2.560MHz FSB 320 *4 or 1280 (20% OC) it runs stable, but cpu gets a bit warm 60's Celcius, need a better heatsink/fan. Haven't tried reducing CPU voltage at that speed but I need to.
I run it at 2.344 FSB 293 * 4 or 1172 (10% OC)

 

[htredneck]

Thanks for the detailed info. That is the exact RAM I was planning on getting tomorrow. I am glad to know it works.

About the problem with heat:

I think is something with this board model or chip set. I have changed from P5GD2 Deluxe to P5B. Everything else is the same. I am sill using P4 Prescott 3.0 GHz (until July). I am still using 533 DDR2 Ram (Samsung) and I am still using after market monster heat sink but temps. are about 10 C higher idle and under load on the CPU then before. The board actually stays COOLER. It makes no sense to me.

I have a few ideas of things to try to cool it down. I´ll let you know.

Thanks again

 

[joescat]

Okay, I'm finally getting around to posting my exact RAM part numbers:

Kingston KVR800D2N5/1G.

I started with two of them, flawless. I bought that memory based on nothing but glowing reviews from others.

I just added two more. Note, for some incredibly stupid reason, this motherboard, when loaded up with 4GB in this fashion, ignore almost 1GB of it! So now, it looks like I have 3008. I remember reading this is so, but I forgot that is throws so much memory away.

 

[rwpritchett]

Did you know that 32-bit operating systems can't use 4 gigs, only about 3? Also, even if you do have a 64-bit operating system, you need to go into BIOS and select the memory remap feature in order to see all 4 gigs.

Hope this helps.

 

[joescat]

Nope, didn't know that! But I'm not sure about all 32-bit O/S's - I have a Server 2003, and that sees all 4GB of memory on its motherboard (not a P5B Deluxe). I do remember reading somewhere before I bought the P5B that if loaded up with RAM, it still doesn't use all of it.

And I thought about running Windows XP 64 bit, but I feared there would be to many other anomalies, and I didn't want to have to screw around with that. Even at 3GB, I have enough memory to do what I need. Like, run Windows Vista in a virtual machine - that that O/S is a PIG! I'll upgrade my main O/S to it eventually as I kind of like the interface so far, but man, what a memory and drive space hog it is!