Can someone answer some general questions about overclocking memory?

[midarkmind]

I have some questions about overclocking RAM on my motherboard. I bought 8GB thinking that I would be running them at 1066mhz, but to my surprise they only clock at 800mhz. I heard that with my kind of build it clocks the memory down when you add more then 4GB of RAM. Can someone please give a concrete explanation? Is there a limitation on the mobo that causes this? Is it even possible to run them at 1066mhz or am I hoping for too much?







Here are the specs of PC:

AMD Phenom II X4 945 Deneb (Overclocked to 3.6GHz) Socket AM3 125W Quad-Core Processor
GIGABYTE GA-MA785G-UD3H AM3/AM2+/AM2 AMD 785G HDMI ATX AMD Motherboard
COOLER MASTER V8 RR-UV8-XBU1-GP 120mm Rifle CPU Cooler Intel Core i7 compatible
Kingston HyperX T1 Series 8GB 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model KHX8500D2T1K2/4G
2 Cross-fired MSI R5770 Hawk Radeons 1GB 128-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.1 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFireX Support Video Card
2 Western Digital Caviar Black WD1001FALS 1TB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive
XION Power Real XON-1250P14HE 1250W ATX 12V v2.2 / EPS 12V v2.91 / SSI v2.92 SLI 3 ways SLI supported.
Thermaltake Element S VK60001N2Z Black SECC ATX Mid Tower Computer Case

 

[midarkmind]

Thanks for all the help guys! =)


OK I tried it and this is what happened...

No voltages would work past the normal 1.8v. I tried 1.9 up to 2.2. No go...
I was pissed. I was thinking that newegg had gotten me again with false advertising and I was cursing Gigabyte and Kingston! However I was using other people’s timings and voltages and I thought that it would work the same on my configuration too. That was not the case. Heck the manufacture states they work with 5.5.18.5 at 1.8v to 5.5.15.5 at 2.2v. When I raised the voltage it simply wouldn't post. So I came across someone that stated that they had them running at 1066mhz with no voltage increase or timing changes. Strange so I tried it without increasing voltage and it worked! I tried this before and it didn’t work. However this time I changed the timings manually to 5.5.18.5. Also my FSB was raised too because of the CPU overclock. That must have made the difference. Sadly I was only able to increase them to 960Mhz =/ Because I have a locked multiplier on my CPU therefore I was not able to match the highest speeds of the FSB and CPU and RAM all together perfectly. One time they did start at 1279MHz but is was short lived. Anyways I am good with this overclock and learned a hard lesson about buying a locked CPU.