Sandy/Ivy Bridge Ram Voltage

[diggiddi]

Hi Guys and Gals I have a quick question.
If Intel says safe voltage range is +/_ 0.05v for the memory controller on their chipsets, why do Ram manufacturers (G. Skill included) produce sticks for intel chipsets ranging from 1.25v to 1.65v, aren't those out range of intels specs? since the safe range should be 1.45v to 1.55v

I guess it must be one of those loosely adhered to specs like the last number in ram timings which should be the sum of the 1st three but is often -3 less and doesn't seem to harm anything

PS. I'm also Looking for a recommendation for 16gb of 2133mhz for Asus z77 pro mother-b, minimum cl9

[Tradesman]

Actually the recommendation is based on stock settings, i.e. with the CPU running at stock GHz and with base DRAM (for most CPUs that's 1333 sticks, the newer CPUs are 1600. So they fully expect with larger sets and OC freqs that the vCore (CPU voltage will be higher) as well as the MC (Memory Controller voltage) norm on Intel is the VCCIO, CPU-VTT, QPI-VTT, or whatever based on mobo and chipset. Thus 1.6 or 1.65 isn't unusual and is safe.

On the DRAM timings that's the way it was (for the most part through the life cycle of DDR2 and early on with DDR3), but towards the end of DDR2 development and they started marketing DRAM outside of JEDEC standards (this was also about the time peopel really started heavily OCing/SLI started hitting it's stride, Crossfire was coming around....the DRAM makers saw theat people wanted higher performance, and DDR3 make a perfect platform for, so while it's still a quasi standard, they tighten up what they can to help gain market share as people today are a little more knowledgeable and pick up on things like timings, same reason you see such a wide range of CLs within a frequency range of DRAM

IN part it will depend on budget, but I normally always recommend getting a set with the lowest CL (CAS Latency) you can, for a Z77, at 16GB, 2133, my first choice would be F3-2133C9D-16GXH, it's a 2x8GB, CL9, Ripjaws X set (the X line was designed/tuned for the 1155 socket), it's a little pricier than the 4x4GB sets, but leaves room for adding more and w/ 2 sticks as opposed to 4 there's less stresss on the MC.....if 4x4GB is more to your liking, this is from a suggestion to Britton30 just a couple hours or so ago

"So, if we look at 4x4GB at 2133 I suggest a CL9 set, if your going to look at the Egg, they have 3 sets as of yesterday, any of which will work fine they're all 9-11-10-28 sets and on an 1155 mobo I'd rate then 1. Snipers F3-17000CL9Q-16GBSR, 2. Ares F3-2133C9Q-16GAB, 3. Ripjaws Z F3-17000CL9Q-16GBZH (and oddly enough, they'll all look good with your mobo selection "

there's more to it also, the suggestions are at the end of this thread

http://www.gskill.us/forum/showthrea...7402#post57402

if any other immediate questions, I'll be around for a short while, then will check in when I run through new member signups in the morning

[diggiddi]

Thank you for clearing that up, your support is extremely useful. I will look at the other post you linked

[Tradesman]

Any further questions, just shout (actually you might want to type )

[diggiddi]

Tradesman here's an Interesting review from Newegg I found Today while doing research on the new 2600 mhz ram
http://www.ocaholic.ch/xoops/html/mo...l_lang=english

"Oxymoron?
Pros: Speed! Fast ram and reasonably priced for it.

Cons: 1.65v

It says made for Z77 but is rated for 1.65v which Intel CLEARLY states is a no-no and highly recommends against it for Ivy Bridge (even for Sandy bridge for that matter)"

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...scrollFullInfo

[Tradesman]

Goes back to what I got into earlier, these sticks obviously aren't going to run at their rated speed with the CPU at stock, the CPU will require an OC, thus vCore goes up, then the MC (memory controller is going to require more juice to run at the rated freq so the differential between MC voltage and DRAM voltage will be within the given 'safe' range.......and for what it's worth Intel is notorious in understating what 'safe' mode is on CPUs in particular. Good example, I got one of the original Q6600s before they even came on the market, my friend at Intel told me it will OC from it's native 2.4 up to 3.0 GHz but over that is not safe, (this was early 2007), and of course (that's when Ocing was really starting to go crazy), as soon as I could I had it to a FSB of 1333 w/ a striker mobo, and it went onward and upward to 1600 and higher, that particular CPU has been running 3.6GHz for a few years now and often it get's run at 4GHz, same same with many other Intel CPUs of that basic era the 6700 (not quite as good an OCer), the 84/86/8600s, many of those I built are still running at around 4GHz, years later...the newer CPUs, seem to be no different. I'll be building a Z77 soon, but want to let them get some of the kinks out first, most mobo makers aren't even up to par yet with the 1155 and 2011 socket mobos when pairing them with high performance/low CL/8GB stick sets. So it may be a bit before they get the new Z77 mobos up and ready 2600, 2666 and 2800 DRAM sets, especially high density ones

[diggiddi]

As per Anadtech

http://www.anandtech.com/show/5728/i...and-biostar/13

ASUS T-Topology Memory

"ASUS have outsmarted Intel and have decided to take their technology to another level. This is specifically in terms of memory, and how it is routed through the motherboard. Typically, routing through the memory would occur in a daisy chain type environment, whereby if data was in the furthest memory slot away from the board, it would take longer to get to the CPU, and perhaps cause synchronization issues and delays?all reads had to be done serially between sticks in the same channel.

With ASUS' new technology, they are essentially parallelizing memory reads that are commonly done serially between memory banks. This is part of their 'T-Topology' memory subsystem, which allows synchronization to be dealt with in hardware. This, according to ASUS, should allow for up to a 15% memory overclock beyond the previous methodology, where the motherboard is the limiting factor. In this circumstance, we could be seeing some new memory records being set in dual channel memory.

I have probed ASUS for specific details on how this works, and I am awaiting a response. I hope that by the time we are allowed to release our Ivy Bridge results on Z77 that I will have something more technical to pass on to you about how this works."

The QVL also lists 2600mhz ram RAM from GSkill and Team on the z77-v and z77-v pro

http://dlcdnet.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/...memory-QVL.pdf

[Tradesman]

NewEgg has a few of the new Trident X series available already