asrock 970 and sniper

[rebelyell]

i just recentley purchased the sniper 2x8gb 1600mhz pc3-12800. i have overclocked them too 1600 but the bandwidth is showing 10700 which it should be 12.8 on cpu-z. i used my azrock eufi bios utility for my azrock 970 pro/3 mobo. my rip jaws 2x4gb where running 12.8. i cannot find anywhere to change the band width setting. i even looked around in my amd overdrive. i do have the sticks set on auto now 999 24 ... manual was 11 11 11 33. and also i can seem to be able to change those timings in my uefi utilty just auto and manual...so mymain question is how do i get the dang sniper to run 12800 like there supposed too. please help thanks....

ps. i have an amd 4170 quad core 4.7 oc this is my new custom build

[Tradesman]

First things first, you MAY be running at 1600 already, where you mention Bandwidth and CPU-Z, it's a sore subject for me, in a nutshell am guessing you saw the 10700 in the SPD tab in the MAX BANDWIDTH window, that is nothing more than the SPD settings for the BIOS to use for a default boot when you first install the system or after a CMOS reset, i.e. mine shows the same and I'm running 2400 sticks at 2400, wrote an info thread on this you can read here:

http://www.gskill.us/forum/showthread.php?t=10565

To find what you are actually running at - go to the MEMORY Tab and check it will give you the freq (yours should show 800 since this is DDR (DOUBLE Data Rate (or 800x2=1600)), give your the BIOS settings for the base timings and the CR (Command Rate).

If not at 1600 can take a look at this thread that will help you set the sticks to 1600, see here:

http://www.gskill.us/forum/showthread.php?t=7688

[rebelyell]

well actually i know to check the mem tab and it is 800mhz 1600 but it does not show the cr cammand rate? i really would like to verify what i actually have running... as far as the data rate tranfer...12.8? or not

thanks

[Tradesman]

Try going to the command prompt and run WINSAT MEM or could get a BM program like MaxxMem Preview and run it to get some marks

[rebelyell]

i am still working on this with your info. i have changed some voltages in the bios. the fsb is 2400mhz acording to cpu-z and the north bridge at 2200mhz but i did set it at 2400 in the bios. the bios will not let me change the cpu nb 200mhz too 240mhz? so i tried using the azrock extreme utility and it crash dumped instantley. but my ram is at 1600mhz. so im still working on trying to find out the tdrate 12800 cammand rate cr....i have 3 different software showing different cpu ocing. one shows my 1 core at my low balanced mhz of 2.9 and 3 of them at 4.7. cpu-z is showing 2 cores at 2.9 and 2 at 4.7 or all the same at the same time bounceing around..lol? my bios is on automatic and is set at core 2 maybe i should put it at core 0 so they are all even??????? confused??

so at this point i will look for good software for accurate readings amd overdrive is basically unusable. exdept for the one i got with my 6850 graphics card. it auto tuned my cpu in a minute :-)

also 2400mhz on the nb is the highest setting in my bios so im wondering if i will ever be able to go to 1866mhz on my ram or 2100 like azrock says ram can oc too? in the future!!!!

anymore info would help. and please check back over the next couple days or hours...thanks
oh yea my bios is still the 1.1 bios version 2.7 :-( as i just got this custom pc...

[Tradesman]

Might want to update the BIOS, current ver is 1.6, can be found here:

http://www.asrock.com/mb/AMD/970%20P...wnload&os=BIOS

[rebelyell]

ok i will give this a try. ill update 1.5 since 1.6 looks as if it is only good for windows 8 and i have win 7...thanks

[Tradesman]

Keep us updated

[Techmeister]

A couple comments...

1. You need to run in full manual mode to stop the CPU frequency from changing. In auto mode the CPU frequency will vary as will the CPU voltage - especially on FX CPUs. If you want the CPU to run at maximum frequency all the time, then you need to disable all of the power saving features such as C1E, C&Q, CPU fan control, Turbo core option and Active power management (APM), - as all of these will change the CPU core frequency depending on load and CPU temp.

2. You will note that the FX processors have additional power saving controls that Deneb and Thuban did not have so all of these need to be disabled. When you update the BIOS these setting may revert back to "auto" in many instances, but not necessarily all settings in all BIOS.

3. You can't change the RAM bandwidth other than via the CPU-NB frequency which is very limited, typically only 200-400 MHz. above the default 2200 MHz.

4. Many BIOS only show the Command Rate when you activate the manual RAM timing option. CPU-Z does NOT show the Command Rate on FX processors IME. AMD's AOD does show the Command Rate on FX processors IME.

[rebelyell]

thanks tradesman,

well i got my bios updated all the way thru up to 1.6... by the way 7.zip does work. you dont need win.zip. just incase some needs to know.. it recomemds winzip only.

ok well stillsame problem cr cammand rate is still 10.7 .....g.skill will be getting these back. falsley advertised. rip jaws run 12800 so im going back to them snipers are a rip off.

iwas runniong 12.8 so its the ram modules....

well any more info would help...but newegg will be getting a call.
and g.skill.....thats a shame

thanks for all your help bud

[rebelyell]

thanks techmiester,

your info was very good. i will note the cpu-z (oc) the new one did show the cr cammand rate untill i shoved these over rated sniper ram modules in. i will try your oc method on manual in the next couple days. it does seem to give an extremely large amount of headroom on most settings with my bios updated 1.6. i just dont want to fry preciuos gold processor. it does say u can oc clear up too 6.3 that isnt going to happen lol.

if you have some good ideas on voltages and a stable 4.7 or 4.9 oclocking they would be apreciated. as it is right now. i dont have any screen blinking like idid at startup 2 or 3 blinks.


i am using the amd over drive that came with my amd 6850 graphics card auto tuned to 4.9 then i backe4d it down to 4.7. then used bios to increase ht, cpu, nb and a couple other voltages and mhz. i did see manual will aloww my north bridge to go to 2400mhz instead of 2200mhz and way farther.
the AOD that i downloaded still says 10.7 which i do not use that only to benchmark my system performance. i did order memtest86 i should have within a week. but it looks like newegg will be getting these multi dvertised ram modules back... im going back to the rip jaws.

even though these snipers r running 1600mhz data transfer rate isnt right (cr cammand rate)

if you have anymore info i would apreciate it thanks...

[rebelyell]

oh i did want to add azrock 970 pr0/3 recomeded i run these 2x8gb modules in slots a2 and b2. just so everyone knows if it makes a differance...im not sure.

or would cmos clearing do any good which i have nevr done.
thanks guys

[Techmeister]

rebelyell-

Glad to help but you seem to be confused on some of the info. The Command Rate is either 1 or 2, not 10.7 or 12.8 The 10.7 or 12.8 is short for 10,700 or 12,800 GB/sec. which is the theoretical memory bandwidth. The 10.7 or 12.8 bandwidth displayed is the theoretical bandwidth at a given RAM frequency. You will find that ALL of the currently available DRAM has virtually identical bandwidth at a given frequency with a given CPU. It does not matter what brand or model RAM you use as long as you run it at the same frequency, it will have virtually the same bandwidth for a given CPU.

If you look at the link below you will see what I am saying about all DDR3 RAM at the same frequency, produces the same GB/sec bandwidth with a given CPU. See the three bottom graphs of DDR3 at different frequencies and they all perform virtually the same. There is no magic in DRAM.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...am,2542-8.html

Yes Asrock and many other mobo makers have switched from recommending A1/B1 sockets to A2/B2 DIMM sockets but either set should work fine IME.

Clearing CMOS won't change the RAM bandwidth, if that's what you are asking.

As far as OC'ing, there are a lot of adjustment in the BIOS and AOD that are way beyond what current CPUs can run, so don't think that your CPU can run at those extreme settings as no CPU produced to date, can.

[rebelyell]

thanks for the info. ok, well i am running my g.skill f3-12800 gsr 1600 mhz snipers. they are set at 1.5 volts 999-24 1600mhz (2t). basicaly stock. 16gb

i would still like to know what data transfer rate i am running at, cant seem too find anything to display that. i think the rip jaws where better..8gb

32 gb capable mobo running amd 4170 quad black edition zambezi 4.2 at 4.7ghz thanks

[Tradesman]

PassMark explains it pretty well here:

http://www.bandwidthtest.net/memory_bandwidth.htm

and you can use their or many other BMs, including windows built in test -

Go to the command prompt and run winsat mem