MB OC Report :: EVGA 790i Reference

[3oh6]

thanks guys...it is just a shame that this NVIDIA 790i chipset doesn't appear to be able to handle vMCH for extended periods of time. i have finished up the OC Report on the 2x2GB Mushkin Ascent PC3-12800 CL7 kit, but it was cut short due to the fact that my board appears to be going south. i have had the NB cooled by water pretty much the whole time it has run since the vMCH volt mod, and i have never gone over 1.65v with it but it has spent an extended amount of time at 1.63v vMCH which appears to be enough to degrade the MCH over the length of a couple months. let this be a lesson to you all, treat these 790is gently or they will die...i think Gautam can attest to this as well

either way, here is what the incredible Mushkins were able to do on this board. the CL6 clocking is particularily impressive as it was the last set of benches i did with this board...

This is an entirely fresh section of this MB OC Report and it will solely deal with the clocking and compatibility of 2x2GB kits of memory clocking. This seems to be the hottest topic surrounding motherboards these days as a lot of users are going the 4GB route. I will keep a diary of sorts of the work I have done with 2x2GB kits on this board so don't mind the vacancy right now, this section will get some tenants rather soon. Starting off with a little Mushkin Ascent 2x2GB PC3-12800 action...this kit of memory is a review sample sent directly from Mushkin and used in a review for HardwareCanucks.com. If you want to see more results from this memory, including full stability testing, just fire me a PM or ask in this thread.


The Mushkin Ascents are a very solid 2x2GB DDR3 offering I have found, and they absolutely love the 790i, in fact, a little too much. Here is the dual 32M SPi breakdown of what they were able to achieve on this board.


At first glance you may think that I am not done with the clocking of this kit...well, that is complete the opposite. To be truthfully honest, this board is done all together. The initial results up to 2.01v were from when I was still completing the review of this memory. I then came back to them specifically for this section, but after the CL6 testing, in which the memory absolutely took off...the board stopped cooperating. It still runs fine and all, but getting clocks north of 500FSB seems to be an issue now. Further more, CL7 is clocking worse than it ever did. I have taken a break from this motherboard for now in hopes it just needs a rest but I have a feeling this MB OC Report has gotten all of the results it is going to.

Here are the screenshots to accompany the results posted above. In all of the screenshots, voltages and all settings should be visible for those interested:

6-6-5-X 1T / 6-5-5-X 1T:
NVIDIA 790i:
Click link for full size screenshot...
740MHz :: 1.86v | 775MHz :: 1.91v | 800MHz :: 1.96v | 820MHz :: 2.01v | 850MHz :: 2.10v | 880MHz :: 2.20v
As mentioned, at CL6, this memory not only surpassed my PC3-16000 2x1GB kit, but did so with less voltage and continued to scale with voltage as far as I was willing to go with it. At one point, I was ready to solder the Maximizer to the EVGA board just to go further with voltage on this kit but decided against it. At an impressive 880MHz 6-6-5, this kit had no problems running dual 32M and likely could do single 32M at close to 890MHz.


7-6-6-X 1T:
NVIDIA 790i:
Click link for full size screenshot...
875MHz :: 1.86v | 895MHz :: 1.91v | 916MHz :: 1.96v | 930MHz :: 2.01v
These above screenshots weren't origianlly intended for the 32M OC Report of this kit but after the review and the CL6 clocking, the board went south so I wasn't able to re-do the CL7 dual 32M clocking and also wasn't able to push past 2.01v. It is a shame because at the pace this kit was going, 970MHz+ looked to be a possibility at 2.20v or less.

8-7-6-X 1T:
NVIDIA 790i:
Click link for full size screenshot...
975MHz :: 1.86v | 1000MHz :: 1.91v | 1000MHz :: 1.96v | 1010MHz :: 2.01v
It is the same story for the CL8 clocking. I only went up to 2.01v to ensure I didn't damage the memory before the review was finished and the plan was to really push them for this report. We might also be looking at the limit of this particular 790i sample as the gains really slowed down above 1.96v with both 1.91v and 1.96v showing similar clocks, just with tighter timings on the higher volts. Even still, 1000MHz at 8-7-6 with a 2x2GB kit for dual 32M is quite nice, especially for a PC3-12800 kit.

[eternal_fantasy]

That's an amazing kit of memory 3oh6, only if they are sold here in the UK...