Issues with first homebuilt - locked CPU/Win 7 not seeing RAM

[qrkyboy]

Greetings all, this is my first actual post here even though I’ve spent a lot of time getting info from browsing and (ugh finally after one RMA) have a system built, my first one in many years (it got way more complex since then). But something isn’t right and I’d like to get some straightforward answers.

System:
NZXT Vulcan, Rampage II Gene, Intel i7-930, 6G GSkill F3-12800CL8T-6GBRM (1600), Asus ENGTX460 GPU, Ultra X4-750 PSU. (I need more cooling, but I'm not attempting overclocking yet and rather nervous to even begin thinking that way).

Issue: Windows 7 only sees 4G of RAM though CPU-Z sees all 6G. I suspect this is because (I didn’t know before) the i7 is ‘locked’ which (I just learned) apparently means max is 1066 even though my RAM is 1600. What would you advise to do in this situation? The system is not 100% stable and that got attributed by minidump to using Windows Update for the GPU drivers from the boards, I changed that out for NVidia ones but I suspect this whole strange RAM situation is the root of it all. Obviously I payed for 6G so I want the 6G, and I payed for 1600 RAM so I want that also. Mathematically speaking if this in fact is true of being locked into 1066 then the three DIMMs won’t be able to be recognized. I don’t think there is anything else necessarily wrong as the 750 PSU should easily power this with room to spare and the CPU is running between 37-50C even under load and stock cooling, the one time I did attempt to change timing to 9-9-9-24 things got ugly fast. The Asus board is just way too fast to even see POST results, I've tried many times and it's a millisecond blip, tried memtest boot disks twice and both must not be able to interact with my videocard or two separate programs failed to create a bootdisk. But if CPU-Z sees it, I don't see how that could be something simply related to a loose DIMM or something. Also: useless though they are, everything except the cheap disk I bought to get me started is reading 7.4-7.6 on Windows Experience Index. And ASUS has been absolutely great from start to finish in dealing with my issues thus far but I think there's a bit more experience in this forum.

thx-
-doug

 

[poppasmurf]

Greetings all, this is my first actual post here even though I’ve spent a lot of time getting info from browsing and (ugh finally after one RMA) have a system built, my first one in many years (it got way more complex since then). But something isn’t right and I’d like to get some straightforward answers.

System:
NZXT Vulcan, Rampage II Gene, Intel i7-930, 6G GSkill F3-12800CL8T-6GBRM (1600), Asus ENGTX460 GPU, Ultra X4-750 PSU. (I need more cooling, but I'm not attempting overclocking yet and rather nervous to even begin thinking that way).

Issue: Windows 7 only sees 4G of RAM though CPU-Z sees all 6G. I suspect this is because (I didn’t know before) the i7 is ‘locked’ which (I just learned) apparently means max is 1066 even though my RAM is 1600. What would you advise to do in this situation? The system is not 100% stable and that got attributed by minidump to using Windows Update for the GPU drivers from the boards, I changed that out for NVidia ones but I suspect this whole strange RAM situation is the root of it all. Obviously I payed for 6G so I want the 6G, and I payed for 1600 RAM so I want that also. Mathematically speaking if this in fact is true of being locked into 1066 then the three DIMMs won’t be able to be recognized. I don’t think there is anything else necessarily wrong as the 750 PSU should easily power this with room to spare and the CPU is running between 37-50C even under load and stock cooling, the one time I did attempt to change timing to 9-9-9-24 things got ugly fast. The Asus board is just way too fast to even see POST results, I've tried many times and it's a millisecond blip, tried memtest boot disks twice and both must not be able to interact with my videocard or two separate programs failed to create a bootdisk. But if CPU-Z sees it, I don't see how that could be something simply related to a loose DIMM or something. Also: useless though they are, everything except the cheap disk I bought to get me started is reading 7.4-7.6 on Windows Experience Index. And ASUS has been absolutely great from start to finish in dealing with my issues thus far but I think there's a bit more experience in this forum.

thx-
-doug

Doug,

I read another thread similar maybe this well help some.

See your CPU specifications at http://ark.intel.com/Product.aspx?id=41447

See the memory limit addressing capabilities of different Windows 7 versions http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa366778(VS.85).aspx

Effectively I7 only supports DDR3 modules up to1066 MHZ but you can go up to 24 GB of addressable physical memory or 6 DIMMs of 4 GB each.

 

[ekoostik]

Issue: Windows 7 only sees 4G of RAM though CPU-Z sees all 6G. I suspect this is because (I didn’t know before) the i7 is ‘locked’ which (I just learned) apparently means max is 1066 even though my RAM is 1600.

Where did you read that the i7 is "locked" to a max RAM frequency of 1066? This is not true. Please provide a link if you have one.

It is true that the highest RAM frequency officially supported by Intel is 1066 - but it is not locked and plenty of folks run their RAM faster.

Try reseating your RAM sticks. Make sure they are all in properly. Also, for now reset your BIOS to the optimized defaults. It will be easier to get the system stable and recognizing all 6GBs with the RAM at 1066. When that is accomplished, the next step will be to stabilize your rig with the RAM OCed to 1600.

Also - what version of Windows 7 do you have? Home, Professtional Ultimate? 32-bit, 64-bit?

EDIT: Can you provide a screenshot of Windows showing 4GB alongside CPU-Z showing 6GB?

 

[qrkyboy]

I've sorted a lot of the issues thus far. The Rampage II Gene is designed for midtower configs in microATX profile. The DIMMS have only one clip so apparently its quite easy to have a DIMM look seated when it isn't...the Intel stock coolers are horrid so I went to Noctua and that works. I can do a lot more but it seems beyond the standard Asus OC profiles I get very disconnected info as to what to do - it''s OC to 3.2GHz now on CPU, I pushed RAM to 1600 and the GTX 460 to 836 with no problems and it's clear there is lots of room to burn on at least CPU and RAM but when I did try manual BCLK to 190 things got bad. (As in frozen) Even under push none of the components are hitting above 53C. Is there not a clear guide for an i7-930 on a Rampage II Gene out there, I've looked and gotten nowhere fast, obviously this hardware can go a lot further: 3.2GHz (via CPU-Level-Up), DRAM pushed to 8-8-8-20 in BIOS and GPU pushed to 838/3804 using Asus SmartDoctor. Those scores are all great and I can live with them fine but now I have to figure out wheter SSD or Momentus as disk is killing performance atm.

 

[ekoostik]

If you want help with an OC, try a new post in the OC section. List out ALL your hardware. Then list what BIOS changes you made and what the result was. You should get some helpful suggestions for other settings you may not have considered, Turbo, LLC, QPI multiplier, etc, etc.