OCing RAM a little going a long way? Or my imagination?

[jtsmith1287]

Hey all!

Real quick, here's my specs off the top of my head

Intel Core2 Duo E6600 (currently OC'd @ 3.4ghz)
2x2gb Gskil PC6400 - 800mhz (currently OC'd @ 900mhz)
2x500gb Hitachi *something something* Raid 0
Asus Striker Extreme Motherboard
Asus Radeon HD 6670

Ok, now for the Question:

I was recently told that Overclocking my RAM was pointless. I want to get this cleared up. My 800mhz ram runs pretty good. I Use Win7, and I don't have a password set because it just wastes time logging in (No one is ever in my house, so whatever, and network is solidly protected). That being said - For those of you using Win7, you'll know the "starting windows" screen where the rainbow fairies fall out of the sky and splat to death on the inside of your monitor. After this is the welcome screen, and for me, it automatically boots to my desktop. With 800mhz, this welcome screen sits for 3-4 seconds before booting over. However, when I OC to 900, this screen is virtually skipped. I see it just long enough to watch it dimm to black and then my Desktop loads. I messed with timings, and for some reason I just can't get anything tighter than the auto settings, (5-6-6-17) at either 800mhz or 900mhz. Also, if I push to 910mhz, system locks up (leaving timings on auto).

So wth? Is this a fluke? I've tested it several times, and always the same. 900mhz seems to be better, but that seems like a really insignificant jump. Or is it not? I also realize that's a poor way of gauging speed, but on top of that the system all around seems to be just a HAIR more responsive. BF3 sure seems to load it's 3gb of crap faster...

 

[toolmaker_03]

Hey all!

Real quick, here's my specs off the top of my head

Intel Core2 Duo E6600 (currently OC'd @ 3.4ghz)
2x2gb Gskil PC6400 - 800mhz (currently OC'd @ 900mhz)
2x500gb Hitachi *something something* Raid 0
Asus Striker Extreme Motherboard
Asus Radeon HD 6670

Ok, now for the Question:

I was recently told that Overclocking my RAM was pointless. I want to get this cleared up. My 800mhz ram runs pretty good. I Use Win7, and I don't have a password set because it just wastes time logging in (No one is ever in my house, so whatever, and network is solidly protected). That being said - For those of you using Win7, you'll know the "starting windows" screen where the rainbow fairies fall out of the sky and splat to death on the inside of your monitor. After this is the welcome screen, and for me, it automatically boots to my desktop. With 800mhz, this welcome screen sits for 3-4 seconds before booting over. However, when I OC to 900, this screen is virtually skipped. I see it just long enough to watch it dimm to black and then my Desktop loads. I messed with timings, and for some reason I just can't get anything tighter than the auto settings, (5-6-6-17) at either 800mhz or 900mhz. Also, if I push to 910mhz, system locks up (leaving timings on auto).

So wth? Is this a fluke? I've tested it several times, and always the same. 900mhz seems to be better, but that seems like a really insignificant jump. Or is it not? I also realize that's a poor way of gauging speed, but on top of that the system all around seems to be just a HAIR more responsive. BF3 sure seems to load it's 3gb of crap faster...

not at all, I have 400MHz memory running at 500MHz that would be equivalent to you running at 1000MHz. so 900MHz is not hard to see at all the real question is the rest of your system, do you have the ability to clock each piece of hardware independently of each other, or when you play with one it affects others. this is the norm when o-clocking, but asus is a designer board, with lots of options so it may be independent. I have a a8v deluxe pro, and can clock memory independently, but it does affect the north bridge frequency, not to mention the heat up on that chip is significantly higher, than the heat up on my memory. so I guess what I am asking, is how are you cooling this, air is not enough for even a little o-clocking. things get hot real quick I have water cooling but I have built extreme systems EX: phase change or liquid nitrogen, these are expensive and not for the norm

 

[gac77]

So is tight timings (lower numbers) better or higher freq (MHz) better .

 

[nbelote]

You're more than likely bringing the RAM closer to being in-line with your CPU's FSB speed (which, without going out on too much of a limb here, is probably 533MHz) and the more you do that the better your performance is going to be. Once you get past that, though, say with RAM that's clocked at 600x2 (1200MHz) you're looking at no noticeable performance gain because the CPU can't keep up with it.

Basically you're getting closer to ridding yourself of your RAM bottleneck by overclocking it like you have. The base clock of your RAM (before being doubled by inherently being DDR) being set to 450MHz is ideal. Now I know you said you can't bring it higher but if your RAM had 533x2 (1066MHz) speeds you'd be golden.

 

[Kamab]

iirc, overclocking RAM to be at a more even ratio to the FSB (from 5:4 to 1:1 or 3:2) can make a very large difference. When the two are run asynchronously there are big latency/timing issues that can negatively affect your system.

This is why you sometimes see people that underclock their RAM and notice better performance.

http://www.madshrimps.be/articles/article/472/#axzz1qiMfiO3B

or search forum for RAM + FSB ratio

 

[toolmaker_03]

iirc, overclocking RAM to be at a more even ratio to the FSB (from 5:4 to 1:1 or 3:2) can make a very large difference. When the two are run asynchronously there are big latency/timing issues that can negatively affect your system.

This is why you sometimes see people that underclock their RAM and notice better performance.

http://www.madshrimps.be/articles/article/472/#axzz1qiMfiO3B

or search forum for RAM + FSB ratio

finally someone who understands that a well balanced system, will run better than just a bunch of good parts thrown together .