The OFFICIAL MSI K8N Neo2-939 tips and tricks guide thread

[Raillex]

Since this is the Neo2 tips and tricks thread, I wondered if anyone might be willing to share a tip on how to get my Neo2 Plat to run any faster than 285 MHz 1:1 dual channel using G.Skill PC-4400 LE. The board will do 9X285 9-3-3-2.5 3X HTT @2.65v vdimm without breaking a sweat but I start getting errors in Memtest at 286 MHz no matter what the voltage and no matter what trcd or trp values I use. Raising CL from 2.5 to 3 nets me a few more error-free Memtest MHZ to 289 but prevents me from even booting into Windows.

My 3700+ tops out at 2.69 GHz@1.6v and I was kind of hoping to make up for its shortcomings by running it at 9X299 instead of my usual 10X269. Am I smoking something here or what?

[Lestat]

Since this is the Neo2 tips and tricks thread, I wondered if anyone might be willing to share a tip on how to get my Neo2 Plat to run any faster than 285 MHz 1:1 dual channel using G.Skill PC-4400 LE. The board will do 9X285 9-3-3-2.5 3X HTT @2.65v vdimm without breaking a sweat but I start getting errors in Memtest at 286 MHz no matter what the voltage and no matter what trcd or trp values I use. Raising CL from 2.5 to 3 nets me a few more error-free Memtest MHZ to 289 but prevents me from even booting into Windows.

My 3700+ tops out at 2.69 GHz@1.6v and I was kind of hoping to make up for its shortcomings by running it at 9X299 instead of my usual 10X269. Am I smoking something here or what?

ok well what happens when you lower the cpu multi to 7x ?
I would consider myself VERY lucky to have tccd ram that runs that high on such low volts, its not very often you see ram like that.

overall it's a mix of the cpu and the ram and the mobo.

you just gotta mess around a bit.
1)
raise your vdimm
2)
lower your cpu multiplier.
3)
lower the HTT Multi to 2.5x
4)
raise your vcore slightly to help stabalize the cpu/memcontroller
5)
raise your AGP voltages to 1.6 or 1.65
6)
lower the ram to 183 or 166 depending on whaqt bios your using, then lower the cpu multi far enough that you can raise the HTT high enough to go higher then where you are right now.

over all if none of that works then

WELCOME TO THE MSI NEO2 PLATINUM OWNERS CLUB!!! and get used to issues like this. lol. your not alone my friend. mine dies at 270-ish actual memory speed.

most of the neo2's that i have seen or used have this issue and there is no fix. you can TRY RMA'ing it but i doubt MSI will RMA it. and you probably would get a motherboard that's worse.

1:1 NEO2's start getting realllllyyyyy flakey at around 275-ish. not all of them but a good many of them.

Lastly... and probably even just as important and forgotten about my AMD64 owners... alot of AMD64's have pretty flakey Memory controllers and there is no fix.. no matter what you do, it wont get higher but running the memory on a divider can sometimes help but usually not.

Sideeffect also has a TCCD bios that has memory settings made up for TCCD ram. look for one of his posts on this page or the last page and he has a link in his sig for his bios's. Grab the 1.B3 TCCD version and give it a try. it might help.

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i was just bored
i think its time for dfi but i want to wait and see what ATI does going to start tweaking timmings

[Raillex]

ok well what happens when you lower the cpu multi to 7x ?

I didn't try 7X mainly because I'd never be able to run anywhere near the 330 MHz I'd need to reach my 2.69 GHz goal on the CPU.

I would consider myself VERY lucky to have tccd ram that runs that high on such low volts, its not very often you see ram like that.

Yeah, I was pleasantly surprised to see it run so well with so little juice, which is exactly the opposite of my SD. I have a feeling this RAM would absolutely fly if the mobo would only let it.

1)
raise your vdimm.

I did, all the way to 2.85v. The more volts I pump into it, the more errors I get in Memtest. Like I say, the RAM works just fine with 2.65v @ 9X285, so I don't think it's a voltage issue.

2)
lower your cpu multiplier.

I'll check it out and see what happens, but I think it will defeat the purpose since I just can't see this RAM running the 330 MHz it will take to get my SD back to my 2.69 GHz goal.

3)
lower the HTT Multi to 2.5x.

Tried that, no help.

4)
raise your vcore slightly to help stabalize the cpu/memcontroller.

Tried that too, no help.

5)
raise your AGP voltages to 1.6 or 1.65.

Yep, that too.

6)
lower the ram to 183 or 166 depending on whaqt bios your using, then lower the cpu multi far enough that you can raise the HTT high enough to go higher then where you are right now.

I thought about that, but decided against it since I would never be able to run the RAM anywhere near its potential due to my low CPU ceiling.

... alot of AMD64's have pretty flakey Memory controllers and there is no fix.. no matter what you do, it wont get higher but running the memory on a divider can sometimes help but usually not.

It could be the memory controller, but I have a sneaking suspicion it's the Neo2 itself. When I first put this rig together, I had an awful time cold booting at anything over 250 MHz as described in this thread. NFM's 1.36 and 1.8 SD bioses fixed that problem and I haven't had an issue since. My point is that this problem appeared after reaching a nice, round 250 MHz figure, not 249, not 247, not 253, but 250 right on the nose. This, plus the fact that MSI's core center overclocking software also just happened to max out at 250 MHz, made me suspect that a this was an artificial ceiling set by MSI's bios writers when they wrote the 1.9 series bios. I'm seeing the same pattern here with this nice, round 285 MHz RAM limit and since other NF3 boards don't seem to have this "feature" at 285 MHz, something tells me I'm dealing with yet another arbitrary MSI-imposed ceiling.

Sideeffect also has a TCCD bios that has memory settings made up for TCCD ram. look for one of his posts on this page or the last page and he has a link in his sig for his bios's. Grab the 1.B3 TCCD version and give it a try. it might help.

Tried that one too, no help.

[sideeffect]

Msi has released another beta of the 1.b bios.

Only change they listed was USB 2.0 works.

Well weve been enabling the usb 2.0 since the 1.9 bios and its always worked

Well maybe MSI did some other things too. I made a mod bios of the 1.B4 with the extra dividers and some more relaxed memory timings.

you can get that from my site.

Ill make a tccd version of the 1.B final when that comes out. It will be soon im sure.

[Raillex]

Well maybe MSI did some other things too. I made a mod bios of the 1.B4 with the extra dividers and some more relaxed memory timings.

you can get that from my site.

Hmmm... I looked there but can't seem to find a 1.B4 version. Which one is it?

I was thinking that one thing that could help me if I can't bust out of this 285 MHz RAM ceiling is a working 216 MHz divider. Any chance of this happening?

[sideeffect]

I changed my link so it goes to the homepage and not the 1.A official bios now.