NegativeCool Posted October 28, 2004 Share Posted October 28, 2004 Hi there. About 9 days ago I built my first computer. I used Corsair's TWINX1024-3200XL for the memory. There's been something buggy about it ever since I got it up and running. I'm trying to troubleshoot it and find the buggy part and I think it may be the memory. First of all... when I try to run Prime95 it runs the first test for about 2 minutes and I get the following error... FATAL ERROR - Rounding was 0.5, expected to be less than 0.4. I've ran both the Microsoft Memory Tester and Memtest86+. Both didn't turn up any errors. Last night I ran GoldMemory Test for an hour and 42 minutes. It got 50% through before I exited the program because it was late and I had to get up early for work. During that time however, it turned up 5 bad bits. Am I on the right track? Thanks! Sean Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wired Posted October 28, 2004 Share Posted October 28, 2004 Welcome to the forums! What motherboard / CPU / FSB / memory timings do you have? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NegativeCool Posted October 28, 2004 Author Share Posted October 28, 2004 Thanks! Don't take this the wrong way... but I wish I didn't have to be here... :p: I have an Asus A8V Deluxe with an AMD Athlon 64 3500+. I have the hypertransport set at 800 mHz right now. The memory timings are set to auto in the BIOS. Since you mentioned timings... I haven't found anyone able to explain exactly what the stand for. I've done some digging on this site and others... and have a very vague idea. I believe that the first number in the A-B-C-D format stands for CAS Latency, right? I have no idea what the others stand for. If you could explain this... that would help me a bit. Thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wired Posted October 28, 2004 Share Posted October 28, 2004 SDRAM CAS Latency: 2T SDRAM RAS to CAS Delay (tRCD): 2T SDRAM Row Precharge (tRP): 2T SDRAM Active to Precharge Delay (tRAS): 5T Those are the timings, in order, for your memory. As for your first comment, I take it you'd rather call for an RMA than the forums? That's always an option. 888-222-4346 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NegativeCool Posted October 28, 2004 Author Share Posted October 28, 2004 Hehe... not necessarily ready for the RMA yet. Not until I'm fairly certain that the memory is bad. The GoldMemory Test is the only one of the three that turned up bad memory. And I didn't even get all the way through that test. Personally... if the memory is bad... then I should get errors in at least one of the other programs, right? I'd like to exhaust all options before I start sending things back. Otherwise I might waste your time and my time... and time is valuable! What I meant by my original comment is that I just wish it worked without problem. Then again, trying to figure this stuff out is exactly the reason I decided to start building computers. So... with that in mind... tonight I will run all three tests exhaustively and see what I get. Is there anything else you can recommend? One more question on the settings. When I leave the settings on auto... CPU-Z tells me the settings are 2-3-2-5. Is it better for me to manually set them? Also... in your reply you mentioned SDRAM but the TWIN1024-3200XL is DDR RAM, right? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wired Posted October 28, 2004 Share Posted October 28, 2004 Meh, just copied/pasted that. Setting them manually is fine. Testing is always good :) How is it in Windows? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corsair Employees RAM GUY Posted October 28, 2004 Corsair Employees Share Posted October 28, 2004 Please put the memory module on slot 1 & 3; make sure that you have the latest BIOS for your MB, and set the following settings on your BIOS; TwinX512 or TwinX1024-3200XL Advanced CPU Configuration/Memory: Memclock Mode: Limit Memclock Value: 2:1 (DDR400) Bank Interleaving: 4/Enabled Burst Lenght: 4 SDRAM CAS Latency: 2T SDRAM RAS to CAS Delay (tRCD): 2T SDRAM Active to Precharge Delay (tRAS): 5T SDRAM Row Precharge (tRP): 2T Jumper Free/Frequency Voltage Control: Spread Spectrum: Enabled CPU FSB Clock: 200 DDR Voltage: 2.7/2.75 Volts All other settings should be set to default settings! Then please test them one at a time with http://www.memtest.org and let’s make sure it's not some other issue! I would run the test for at least 2-3 passes to be sure! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NegativeCool Posted October 28, 2004 Author Share Posted October 28, 2004 For the most part it runs fine in Windows. I say for the most part because every now and then it'll crash. The error message that pops up on the screen goes by so fast I can never read what it says. However, when I transmit the log to Microsoft, it tells me it crashed because of a device driver. I've been trying to find out exactly what triggers the crash, but I haven't been able to nail down any one thing. It's done it with IE open. It's done it just sitting there. It's done it while playing various games. (Farcry, Star Wars Galaxies, Full Spectrum Warrior, Diablo II.). I had a sneaking suspicion that it might be the video card driver. So I've tried a couple of them. And it still crashes. And no matter what... I get that error in Prime95. I was almost certain it wasn't the memory until I saw those errors in GoldMemory. I will try what RAM GUY suggested when I get home from work tonight. Thanks a bunch... I'll post what I find. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
a1zhang Posted October 28, 2004 Share Posted October 28, 2004 Please put the memory module on slot 1 & 3; make sure that you have the latest BIOS for your MB, and set the following settings on your BIOS;... Is it still Dual Channel if you put those on slot 1 & 3? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corsair Employees RAM GUY Posted October 28, 2004 Corsair Employees Share Posted October 28, 2004 I would make sure that you have the Dim Voltage at 2.8 Volts and if you have a NVidia 5200-5700 or ATI 9200-9600 Video card I would set the AGP Voltage to 1.6 Volts as well. And I would suggest http://www.memtest.org as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NegativeCool Posted October 28, 2004 Author Share Posted October 28, 2004 I'm running a nVidia 6800 GT. Quite a power hog from what I've read about it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NegativeCool Posted October 29, 2004 Author Share Posted October 29, 2004 Alright. So I made the changes in the BIOS to what you said. I ran Memtest86+ 3 times and got no errors. I ran Prime95 and instead of giving me an error in like two minutes... it ran over an hour before giving me the same error. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corsair Employees RAM GUY Posted October 29, 2004 Corsair Employees Share Posted October 29, 2004 If memtest86 found no problems or errors on the memory, then I will suggest you to look at other hardware/peripherals installed on your system. I do not think the problem is coming from the memory modules! If you have additional PCI card installed on your system, make sure that it is not installed on PCI slot#4 since it is sharing IRQ with the AGP card; in addition please check any software that you have loaded in your system and see if they are fully compatible with your OS, I will also try to clear the cache and system files and scan disk my HDD and see if it is good or... Hopefully this helps you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NegativeCool Posted October 29, 2004 Author Share Posted October 29, 2004 I've been digging around on some other boards and found a couple of threads where users are having the same kind of problem in Prime95 while running dual channel memory with the same setup I have. The issues seem to be settled by relaxing the memory settings a bit. My question is... am I going to notice any drop in performance if I relax these settings a little bit? I would have started a new thread since this really isn't concerning a Warranty issue... but I think I've almost figured out what I need to do to stabilize my system. That and you have an idea of what my problem is. Thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corsair Employees RAM GUY Posted October 29, 2004 Corsair Employees Share Posted October 29, 2004 Performance will drop but not as much, it should still be a fast system with a good performance on it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NegativeCool Posted October 29, 2004 Author Share Posted October 29, 2004 Thanks! You've been extremely helpful! Tell your boss/supervisor you deserve a raise! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corsair Employees RAM GUY Posted October 29, 2004 Corsair Employees Share Posted October 29, 2004 Please let us know how you make out with this! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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