Setting up RAM Timings for real world situations

[Johnny Bravo]

Alright girls(?!?) and guys- as you may or may not know I'm a bit new round hear-tho I'd been reading these forums for the past few months on the fly (another mysterious "guest"). So heres the deal.

I build all sorts of computers for people and have recently been building alot of SFF PCs for people that are very quiet and flash looking. Recalling the good old days of bolting 9 fans to the side of a PC to gain a few extra MHz and create a new weather front from the ensuing pressure difference created-I thought "wouldn't it be great to make a super cool son-of-a-CRAY kinda computer using all the coolest and fastest bits of technology out there". So I went about looking for all the coolest and fastest bits of technology out there and came back with this lot:-

Vapochill XE (I know wot you lot are like about mach II's round here but hey bite me :D )
the IC-7 MAX3 (waahey)
P4 2.8-3.0 GHz (depends on the prices when I go shopping)
2 raptors in RAID 0 (more on this later)
9800 PRO 256MB (for all that MATlab and Pspice and err...HL2)
the usual in DVD/RW and input devices

(whoo ALOT of you guys have had the same idea i see :banana: )

notice something missing...RAM!!! My main question is there is ALOT of stuff on this forum about RAM and *honest* I have been looking round rather than being lazy and starting a new thread just to get a quick answer.

There seems to be alot of talk about using the 1:1 divider instead of say 5:4 or 3:2...why is this? also there seems to be a group of you that believe in the power of running your timings as close to zero as possibable somming like 2:2:5 or the likes. The thing is, has anybody been doing both of these things and is there any real world performance benefit or just higher FSB and sandra scores? I really don't care if my PC doesnt come out top of the pile (which, might I add, round here it really WON'T...EVER!!!!:rolleyes: )but I do want some hardcore performance thats gonna be stable (finals and alot of project work to get done and I dont want this thing dying each time I want to simulate something on it!!! cus its running "on the edge (TM)").

Tell me of your experiences with PC4200 RAM as I'll probably be getting this sort from OCZ (gold styli) or if anybody else has better RAM. I noticed a thread started the other week for RAM comparision but they seems to be dealing with "slower" PC3500 chips.

Thanks in advance

JB

[Major]

Johnny Bravo welcome to Xtreme Forums ! Glad to see you here ! ;)

Thats a nice shopping list ! Get you some ram with tight timmings, cas 2. I'd stick with BH-5 chips, you've got alot of headroom with the Vdimm on the Max3. Run 5:4 divider and tight timmings, that will give you the best overall performance.

[Johnny Bravo]

thanks Major

Yeah I hear this chip mentioned alot in these forums

Back in the UK here I'm wondering where to get these. I know of winbondbut who else uses these chips in there RAM?

[Major]

Right now most ram are going to the Ch5 chips so BH5 are becoming hard to find. Corsair XMS3200LL, XMS3500C2, Hyper X 3200 & 3500 should all be BH5. Also the Mushkin Level 2 are BH5 I beleive.

[Johnny Bravo]

I remember there being taalk of a BH4 chip- is this correct?

What is the difference between BH and CH?

[JeffPH]

welcome to xtreme johnny!

BH oc's better than the CH chips.

[Johnny Bravo]

Hi JeffPH

so why was it then that people cose to run 1:1, as I was under the illousion (!!!) that this was so the RAM and CPU were in sync therefore removing any wait times that would be incurred by a stepper

[Major]

Long thread but excellent reading !!

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=12734

[karmakid]

www.smcdirect.com has got kingston hyperX 3500 which are rated 2-2-2-6-1t, they are BH-5

www.pc-memory-upgrade.co.uk has mushkin 3500 lvl2 they are also BH-5 but costs a bit more.

[Johnny Bravo]

Thanks for the link major some excellent nuggets of info in there; but wait:

The 2.4C/800 Processor...
http://www.monsterboxpc.com/roundup2/800.gif

According to this table the greater performance was from the 1:1 divider rather than the 5:4, so should that be the direction I take??

[Major]

Lol.....:D

Ok, for the same OC 1:1 offers better performance IF you can run tight timmings. But with your 3.0c and vapochill IMO you should be able to hit 4ghz maybe more. Thats a 267fsb, There's not alot of ram floating around that can do 2-5-2-2 at 267mhz !! So your looking at (very best scenaro) 2.5-3-3-7 at 1:1 267fsb or 2-2-2-5 at 5:4 (memory at 214mhz) same fsb of 267.

This is an old old old argument, do a search and you will find a dozen threads about this same issue. ;)

[Johnny Bravo]

hey why is PC3500 RAM got so much better timings than higher speed RAM.

I mean is there any point in getting PC4200 when PC3500 will do the trick???

[Johnny Bravo]

AHHHH THE PENNY DROPS!!!!

[Johnny Bravo]

Anybody any good ideas for articles on RAM esp. timing and the hardware itself-I feel the need to do some serious research

[Major]

:D

[Johnny Bravo]

:D
yeah I am getting lazy arn't I !!!!!

[Johnny Bravo]

So this (http://www.gobeyondltd.com/products/results.asp?id=48) is what I'm looking for then :p:

[bigjohns97]

Originally posted by Johnny Bravo
Thanks for the link major some excellent nuggets of info in there; but wait:

The 2.4C/800 Processor...
http://www.monsterboxpc.com/roundup2/800.gif

According to this table the greater performance was from the 1:1 divider rather than the 5:4, so should that be the direction I take??

look more closely at the graph above, the ram is running at 320 on one set.

[Johnny Bravo]

actually thats accounted for at the top of the thread

note that both are running 12x200