atec Posted February 4, 2006 Share Posted February 4, 2006 I have been having stability issues when I use this RAM. I ran memtest for 3 hours with them set to 265mhz 2.5-4-4-8 2.80V (the vdimm was around 2.80, but I have tried many different vdimms between 2.75 and 2.88 and I always get the same stability problems) for 3 hours with no problem, however, I am yet to run prime95 for more than a couple of hours with them in. Yesterday I replaced the RAM with some other 512 3200 RAM and ran prime95 for 12 hours no problems. Below is a more detailed account of what I've done. I have the twinx1024-4400c25pt ram, a dfi lanparty ut expert motherboard, opteron 165, and an xfx 7800gt. I stripped down the system to just the ram, cpu, motherboard, graphics card, hdd, and optical drive. I found that the system was unstable with the bios set to default settings, and unstable with i/o settings set to 'optimised' settings. These settings range from 290mhz to 230mhz fsb, each with a range of vcores/vdimms/ram-fsb ratios etc. Nothing has been stable. First I thought it might be the motherboard or bios. I tried two different motherboards (the other was an asus a8n32-sli), and a variety of bios versions for each (including official, beta, and modded versions). I actually found that the system was most unstable with default settings. But all was ultimately unstable. I tried formatting and reinstalling windows many times throughout to make sure there was no driver conflicts or any other artefacts causing the trouble. I always found that prime 95 and cpu stability crashed after anywhere between 3 mins and a few hours. I have tried call of duty 2, half life 2, battlefront 2 - all crash. Sometimes they refuse to start, and sometimes crash after an hour or so. I get many instruction set errors, memory read/write errors, and occassional bsod. All this is cleared up with different ram though. Since you are sure there aren't compatibility issues between this ram and my motherboard (I read a response to a query about this in another thread somewhere), I suspect there might be a problem with the RAM. I am going to leave memtest for 24 hours and see if it comes up with anything. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wired Posted February 4, 2006 Share Posted February 4, 2006 Well if you're comparing the stability of an OC'd rig to a default setting rig, then not much will be accomplished. Here's what I'd try. Set the 4400C25 to PC3200 speeds, see how it tests out. Also, have you ever OC'd this CPU before? Have you tried one stick at a time? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
atec Posted February 4, 2006 Author Share Posted February 4, 2006 Sorry, Maybe I wasn't very clear. I have been trying out different configurations for the last 2 weeks. In that time I have run around 20 different configurations, with different bios versions and even different motherboards. This may sound like i'm spreadin myself thin. But after checking one and finding that it is unstable, I move on to another. I'm just summarising because if I explained in detail everything I've done, it would take a very long time to read. Essentially, I began with the default settings with each bios version and motherboard. When I say default settings, I mean bios defaults. This would be 200mhz fsb, 1.34 vcore, 2.67 vdimm, and 'auto' selected for all memory timings. These are all the settings set by the bios by default. When this was unstable, I would raise the settings to try and make it stable. trying slightly different vcores and vdimms. But ultimately, since the default settings were unstable, I initially considered problem to lie with the bios or the motherboard. It is for this reason that I've been concentrating on bios versions and motherbaords. It's only been the last couple of days that i've been looking at the possibility of the ram being at fault. The closest i've found to something that really points to the ram is the fact that when I replaced the ram, and left the bios set to its default settings (I think I referred to them as i/o settings in my last post), which has always been unstable with the corsair ram, became stable with different 3200 ram. When I say unstable, i am finding that after an hour the system fails what it is doing. If it is running prime 95, it stops. If it is running a game, the game crashes etc. But yesterday I ran prime 95 at those settings with different ram for 12-13 hours with no problems. I have only run memtest on the sticks for about 7 hours in total, and so far there have been no problems. However, I have had bad ram before, and I am recognising alot of the same symptoms. The ram was in a dell system, and could happily run dell diagnostics no problem. I could also play games, run windows etc, for maybe 30-40 mins, before it crashed. Essentially, just because memtest hasn't found a problem does not sufficiently satisfy me that the problem may not be the memory. I had already begun running one stick at a time. I tried memtest for a couple of hours, but at this moment, I think prime seems to be finding more problems, so that's what i'm concentrating on. I'll report my findings in a few hours. I just wanted to ask whether this seemed like it could potentially be a ram problem. thanks for your help, by the way, I know I've written a lot, and it must be tedious to have to spend your time fixing other people's (potentially stupid) problems, but it's really appreciated. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
atec Posted February 5, 2006 Author Share Posted February 5, 2006 i ran prime 95 on two machines with one stick in each. One machine has a dfi lanparty ut expert, the other is an athlon xp machine, with an asus a7n motherboard. the xp machine is an old, tried and tested machine. I used default settings with both machines. 200mhz, memory timings set to default. In both machines I left the vdimm at default. I found the same stick failed in both machines, while the other worked fine. I then tried, just in case the vdimm wasn't high enough, setting it to 2.75V, and found the same stick failed, while the other worked fine. I then changed the settings from default to 275mhz, 2.5-4-4-8, 2.75v, and the same stick failed again - or rather the system crashed. I am now testing the other ram with these settings. But at this point, whatever the outcome of this final test, i think I'm going to return the ram. This final test will merely check to see if 275mhz 2.5-4-4-8 at 2.75v is stable with this ram. I idea being that if it is stable with one stick, but not the other, then that stick is suspect. But it is unstable with both, then it's the settings that are suspect. However, since it failed so many other tests, which the other stick didn't, i'm almost certain that it needs to be changed, and that it isn't entirely the fault of some setting or compatibility. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corsair Employee RAM GUY Posted February 6, 2006 Corsair Employee Share Posted February 6, 2006 Can you tell me the bios settings you have set for both CPU and memory and any performance settings that you may have set? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rejectcase Posted February 12, 2006 Share Posted February 12, 2006 hey ive been having the same issue (well except mine started stable and started failing over time and getting worse. ((i have been running my ram in dual channel mode for about 3 months and soon after istarted getting memory errors in windows / lockups or flat out crashes. its timmings have been 2.5-3-3-6 @2.7v then i had to turn to 3-4-4-8 and its getting worse. i have bumped the vdimm to 2.8v. and I noticed when i have the two sticks in slot 2 and slot 4 of my mother board (dfi=sli-dr) works fine, if i reverse the two sticks in the same slots-2+4 then my system woulnt boot past the post test without memory errors. if tried the same thing with a differant name brand and dont see the problem.)) maybe some of my trouble shooting may help your situation as well. ***still unresolved** oh and by the way ive been trying to play Battlefield 2 / morrawind and need for speed underground 1+2+mostwanted with same failure problems. my multi is at 12x fSB/LTD 250+ 240+ 245 +235+255 ive tried them all with a 200mhz 180mhz 160 mhz 133 mhz = its no diff it still generates the same problem and its dfi sli-dr recommended ram via the web site -same for your mother board moddle as well- Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corsair Employee RAM GUY Posted February 12, 2006 Corsair Employee Share Posted February 12, 2006 Please set the Dim Voltage to 2.75 volts (+.2 Volts W/Giga-Byte) and then set the timings manually to Cass 2-3-2-5 at DDR400 with out over clocking and then test the module/'s one at a time with www.memtest.org! If you still get errors, please follow the link in my signature “I think I have a bad part!” and we will be happy to replace them or it! However, if you get errors with both modules that would suggest some other problem and I would test them in another system or MB to be sure Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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