RAM holding me back?

[goreblast]

My System

Newcastle 3500
Abit AV8 with 1.7 bios
XP120 heatsink with 120mm DELTA fan
OCZ Rambooster at 2.9V
OCZ PC3200 Plat Rev2 2x512 RAM
OCZ Powerstream 520W
Gigabyte X800XT (w/ arctic cooler)
Win2k SP2 - benchmark installation

Individual highest 'clocks

All obtained on Boxing Day with room temperature of 15C
CPU - max benchable speed 2700MHz at 1.825vcore
HTT - highest was acheived at LDTx4 - benchable at 275HTT, 1.35v
RAM - 1T 2-2-2-5 benched at FSB 220
1T 2.5-3-3-7 benched at FSB 245
both at 2.9V

Unfortunately I have not had a nice cold day like that since when I have been able to benchmark. Best room temperature I can hope for at the moment is a toasty 25C !!!

The Radeon is maxxed out at 540/570 ! Whilst better than its stock of 500/500 its not great and is making me wonder about doing the pencil mod to get some more volts. Upping either GPU or Mem by anymore results in 3DMark01 dropping back to the desktop.

I have done the Ricky Tweak and have all sliders at max performance in Radlinker - using Omega drivers. Also bare install with absolute minimum installed. I run 3d at Realtime priority, although I haven't done a full run with all the services (except the 3 you cant stop) stopped.

Temperature of CPU under full load whilst benching is 59C !!! idles ar 40C - according to the 3rd eye. System temp is between 25 and 30.

What can I do to push score up? Is it better to try and run 1:1 with loose timings? or very tight timings using a divider? Thinking of either VX or GSkill LC (only one in UK) memory - any good? Please help. I want 30K


50th post !!!!

[Ironlegion]

Yo dude, What about flashing the bios of the x800xt to a x800xt pe, try www.over-clock.co.uk for more help. But i got one question the ddr booster does it work well with the abit av8 as i emailed ocz about the compatibility for the av8 3rd eye and they said to thier knowledge it doesn't work so any info you can shed on that would be handy. :)

[Jrocket]

Don't buy new Ram! Just boost your Vdimm to something in between 3.1-3.3. That is some good ram, but your just not going to get that high of clocks with 2.9v.

[goreblast]

Jrocket - didnt think TCCD liked lots of voltage!? or is at a case that higher volateg doesnt increase the overclock, but just makes it more stable?

Ironlegion - I have the booster in slot 2 (nothing can go in slot 1 with the XP120 installed) and the memory in slots 3 and 4. Seems to be working fine - no issues at all. The 3rd Eye shows what the board reads the voltage as - even above the limit (2.8) in the bios. Good to have two reference points - the boosters lcd and the 3rd eye.

[Savuti]

What can I do to push score up? Is it better to try and run 1:1 with loose timings? or very tight timings using a divider? Thinking of either VX or GSkill LC (only one in UK) memory - any good? Please help. I want 30K

With that cpu and card clocks you should be able to obtain 30k relatively easily. It does seem that your ram is holding you back. As you may have already found out various 3dmark01 tests responds differently to various combinations of memory bandwidth and latencies.

Ideally, memory divider aside, one should strive to go for the highest memory frequencies with tightest 'benchable' sub timings. Have you tried the A64 tweak utility by CodeRed?

And regards to those rams you're considering it depends on your preference. i probably would go for the OCZ vx since you have the booster to really push it. While it can't go as high as the Gskill, it can hold its own and at the same time maintain that 2-2-2-x timing. But as others have mentioned try pushing those sticks that you have with the booster first and take it from there.

[glock19owner]

Don't buy new Ram! Just boost your Vdimm to something in between 3.1-3.3. That is some good ram, but your just not going to get that high of clocks with 2.9v.

Why go to 2.9v with OCZ when they can do default voltage 2.65v with G. Skill...

I would get different ram if I was you to be honest...this is the LC's..the LE's and LA's are better...the LC's and LE's OC to about the same FSB/HTT and timings in the end...but the LA's tend to do a lot better...

my LC's do 5-3-3-2.5 at 250 and this at default voltage and 1:1 timings (see attachments)...

284FSB is the max I can run at 8-4-4-2.5/1T/1:1 at default voltage

[Jrocket]

[QUOTE=goreblast]Jrocket - didnt think TCCD liked lots of voltage!? or is at a case that higher volateg doesnt increase the overclock, but just makes it more stable?
TCCD isn't as voltage hungry as windbond chips, but increasing from 2.9v to 3.2v should give you a boost.

Also, Gskill is great memory I just think he should try to get the most out of his mem now before spending alot of money on new RAM.

[goreblast]

Also it seems that I am having to pump way too much voltage through the CPU - most peeps are hitting higher clocks with less (a lot less) Vcore.

Will try upping Vdimm and see if it helps

[Ironlegion]

Savuti:
Have you tried the A64 tweak utility by CodeRed?

yo dude could you possible post the link for me, to the ultility?

thanks in advance legion. :)

[goreblast]

I have tried the a64 tweak thing, but not too sure what Im doing with some of the settings.

I just tried upping the voltage to 3.2 using the booster and machine crashes on way into windows. Gonna take it out altogether and see what I can acheive at stock (up to 2.8) voltage.

[Dunk]

goreblast, this thread might be helpful in that regard: http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=37345&highlight=codered

[goreblast]

Cheers Dunk

[Dunk]

welcome, happy tweaking, give it what for! :D

It's gettin tougher to find these little gems with all the clutter :(