Gigabyte GA-K8NSNXP-939 running DDR400 RAM at DDR201 in dual channel mode

[midisam775]

Specs:

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Gigabyte GA-K8NSNXP-939

Athlon 3500+ 939 90nm

Corsair TwinX1024-3200LLPT

2 Sticks CMX256A-3200LLPT

ATI Radeon 9600

 

BIOS Settings:

===========

 

Memory:

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Current Memclock (MHz) : 100

CAS Latency: 2

RAS to CAS Delay (tRCD): 3

Row Precharge (tRP): 2

Active to Precharge Delay (tRAS): 6

Enable 2T Timing: Disabled

 

Voltage:

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CPU Voltage Control: Normal (Default)

Normal CPU VCore: 1.4V (Read only)

AGP Voltage Control: +0.2V (as suggested in this forum for ATI Radeon 9600 cards)

DDR Voltage Control: +0.2V (as suggested in this forum for this Corsair RAM)

 

Other Settings:

===========

 

USB Keyboard Support: Disabled

USB Mouse Support Disabled: Disabled

 

CPU Overclock in MHz: 200 (Default)

AGP Overclock in MHz: 66

HT-Link Voltage Control: Normal (Default)

 

 

Problem:

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When I run memtest86 v1.51, it shows me the following:

 

Settings: RAM: 100 Mhz (DDR201) / CAS: 2-3-2-6 / Dual Channel (128 bits)

 

Questions:

========

 

1) What can I do to get this to run at DDR400 ? :) I tried changing the "Max Memclock (MHz) from Auto to 200. When I restarted with this setting, the mobo gave me long beeps and wouldn't even POST in to the BIOS. I had to revert back to "Auto" and now it's back to 100 MHz.

 

2) There is a HT Frequency setting in the BIOS which is currently at 5X. I have no idea what this does. Do I need to change this to assist with this problem?

 

3) Should I change the HT-Link Voltage Control?

 

4) Should I enable the 2T timing back? It was enabled by default and I explicitly disabled it.

 

5) How many passes of memtest is a safe time to stop testing further if there are no errors? I ran one pass so far with no errors. I'll leave this overnight to have it run more passes.

 

6) Is it also advisable to test with Prime 95? Prime95 torture test fails in less than a minute. I get the following error "The exception unknown software exception (0xc00000fd) occurred in the application at location 0x00434955". This is not good :(

 

Note: I have not tried testing this with just the TWINX pair in dual channel mode as I would ideally like this to work with all four sticks. As soon as I'm done testing the four sticks, I will test with just two of them.

 

Thank you.

[Wired]

test with only 2 sticks first.

[midisam775]

test with only 2 sticks first.

 

Thanks. I now have two sticks (the TWINX from my specs above). They are at DDR402 and i'm stressing it now with prime95. It's been running for about two hours now and seems to be fine. Now how could the motherboard enable dual channel and set the frequency to DDR201 with the four sticks. I should mention that even with four sticks, memtest ran fine and prime95 was stressing, just taking longer to go through the tests.

 

I've been trying to find a lot of information about this four slot issue. Some posts seem to suggest that I need to tweak (lower) the HT multiplier and increase the CPU frequency and voltage. I have no idea what values to set and feel a bit weird just trying stuff out without really understanding it.

[midisam775]

So anyone have any ideas what I need to do to get four sticks to work at DDR400? As mentioned earlier, with four sticks the memory runs at DDR201. With two sticks, the memory runs at DDR402. Would someone (like RAM_GUY) also answer the other questions if possible? The questions are asked at the beginning of the thread so if you would reply to those, I would really appreciate it.

 

Thanks

[RAM GUY]

With more than 2 modules you would need to slow the memory, and I dont know if they have give the option on this MB to run the memory at DDR333 but if they did I would try and manually set the memory to DDR333 and set the Dim Voltage to +.2 Volts as well.