F2-8500CL5D-4GBPK on Asus M3A78-EM

[avithe1]

Motherboard : Asus M3A78-EM (BIOS 1805)
RAM : F2-8500CL5D-4GBPK
CPU : AMD Athlon X2 7750 BE 2.7 GHz

Recently I came across this QVL list from ASUS and was happy that they have F2-8500CL5D-4GBPK on it.

Here's that QVL.

As per the recommendation I've put one stick on Yellow slot and one on Black Slot.

I am still not getting 1066 MHz out of this RAM.

My BIOS is at the default settings and I dont know how to configure it manually.

Plz help.

[genetix]

Hmm, knowing the board. There should be select 'memory profile'(at 'JumperFree Configuration') on BIOS use that. Should get the memory clean on 1066mhz. However, as said know the board this is a bit picky on memory. Anyway to manually set the memory on BIOS > Advanced > memory configuration > you'll find the values to set. Should work pretty straight forward on CL5-6-5-16-4-55 at 1066Mhz(You set the memory at 'JumperFree Configuration'-Pages.), if you don't wanna fight with the memory.

If, you wanna get everything out from memory well it'll go still few clicks lower than CL's mentioned above even lower than the stock values, but as said it needs a bit testing. Something like Trc rise a couple ticks and so on.


Hope that helps.

[CloudHead]

Hi !
I have exactly the same setup, and cannot get it stable at 1066Mhz.
What should be the settings for this mobo ? (what are the order for the settings cited earlier ? Tcl/Trcd/Trp/Tras/Trrd/ Trc ? If the last nubemr (55) is Trc, I'm afraid the bIOS wont let set it that high). Anyway, those settings just give me a black screen.

Leaving the Auto timings with 533Mhz speed and 2.1v voltage boots alright, but don't pass any test and crash the machine after a short while. And is quite slow in the benchmarks.

What reading/writing/latency speeds are to be expected on this setup at 1066 ?
I get curiously low writing memory speed at 800 (~4500M/s in everest benchmark, compared to 8000+M/s with a pair of Kingmax DDR800 I have around).

Thanks in advance !

[GSKILL TECH]

You may want to test each stick first just to make sure you don't have a defective stick.

tCL 5 - tRCD 5 - tRP 5 - tRAS 15 - tRC 23 and you may also need to increase the NB voltage slightly.

Keep us posted on your progress.

Thank you

GSKILL SUPPORT

[genetix]

If the last nubemr (55) is Trc

nah, that was my mistake (the last number). tRC should around 21t-23t, 23t as suggested above is probably correct.

What reading/writing/latency speeds are to be expected on this setup at 1066 ?
I get curiously low writing memory speed at 800 (~4500M/s in everest benchmark, compared to 8000+M/s with a pair of Kingmax DDR800 I have around).

You should be looking at rough ~9200MB/s with latency of ~47-53ns. However, on 1066Mhz CLs a bit higher latency doesn't go straight forward on that. to be honest 800Mhz on low latency would probably be fastest you can get.

[CloudHead]

You may want to test each stick first just to make sure you don't have a defective stick.

tCL 5 - tRCD 5 - tRP 5 - tRAS 15 - tRC 23 and you may also need to increase the NB voltage slightly.

Keep us posted on your progress.

Thank you

GSKILL SUPPORT

Thanks for the answers !

When raising the NB Voltage (+50mv) the system seems to run ok with the RAM at 1066 and these settings (though i didn't deeply test the stability yet, I had no crash, and memtest ran OK)

Edit : after using a memory intensive app (Farcry), it's obvious the system is not stable : application or system crash, quite fast after loading a level.

Though, I get strangely low results in the Everest memory benchmarks (had better results with lower grade DDR800 memory sticks) :
Reading : 7413 Mb/s
Writing : 4634 Mb/s
Copy : 5956 Mb/s
Latency : 57.7 ns

What am I missing ? Is there a bios setting I should look after ? (tWR maybe ? Interleaving type ?)

Everything is at stock speed (CPU : 2700Mhz, NB at 1800Mhz, Memory is in unganged mode).

[Coffeebeans]

I have a similar setup:

Asus M4A78-EM
F2-8500CL5D-4GBPK
Phenom II X4 940 BE

The system is perfectly stable at 800mhz, 5-5-5-15 dual channel.
At 1066mhz however, I have trouble even getting the system to post. At 2.1v, and much more relaxed timing, I can make it past post and almost into windows.

I'm using the latest bios, and I'm guessing there must be something really basic I'm not doing right. I have manually set FSB to 200mhz, HT to 1800mhz, stock multiplier, increased the NB and chipset voltage, and I have yet to make it into windows.

I also don't see any options in the bios for Command Rate. CPU-z tells me I'm at 2T when the board is reading off the spd. I don't know if it actually stays at 2T when manually selecting 1066mhz (can't make it into windows

Also, when inputting timings, I have the option to do it for DCT0, DCT1, or both. I'm choosing both and entering the same timings, is that the correct way?

[GSKILL TECH]

CloudHead, have you tried each stick individually? See if you can have them run 1066 individually to insure that a stick is not defective. Do you have the latest BIOS? Also, you may want to try increasing the tRC or leaving it at AUTO. Just make sure you always have the tCL 5 - tRCD 5 - tRP 5 - tRAS 15 timing settings manually.


Coffeebeans, you will need to unlink your FSB to RAM or increase your FSB speed to match the RAM memory. When inputting timings, simply have the one setting for timing since we are trying to get it to run at the rated timing. What is your FSB and NB voltage?

GSKILL SUPPORT

[Coffeebeans]

So I played around with the settings some more.

I had my FSB/ram unlinked but that wasn't giving me any luck going straight to 1066mhz.
So I dropped my CPU and HT multiplier all the way down, and started increasing the FSB in small increments, leaving memory on 1:2. With 5-5-5-15 @ 2.1v, I maxed out memtest stable somewhere between 230~235 FSB or 920~940 mhz DDR2. Other timings are set to auto.

I tried loosening the timings to 6-6-6-18, which is the highest this motherboard allows, and memtest still fails withing 10 seconds at 1066mhz. Bumping both chipset and CPU-NB voltage up didn't make any difference either.

Asus had the F2-8500CL5D-4GB listed as a Qualified 1066 ram for this motherboard, but the weird thing is the SPD readings for these sticks are 48 for tRC, and 13 for tWR, and the latest bios doesn't allow timings anywhere near as high as those. I am starting to think they are not really compatible, or something got changed in the later bios (either that or I got a bad batch of ram).

Kinda running out of ideas now...any more tips?

[GSKILL TECH]

I know there have been several updates for this specific motherboard, so here are the links just in case you don't have them:

BIOS 0603 http://www.mediafire.com/?ztzwfzmnnkm

ASUS BIOS update: http://support.asus.com/download/dow...Language=en-us

AI Tuning> Manual
Memory Voltage> 2.088V
NB CHIP Voltage> 1.409V
DRAM Ganged Mode> Unganged
Memory Clock Frequency> DDR2 1066

What are your CPU and HT multipliers set at?

Keep me posted on the progress.


GSKILL SUPPORT

[Coffeebeans]

I believe that is the wrong board, the M3NA78/M4AN78 linked are Geforce 8300 chipsets; the M3A78/M4A78 are AMD780g based.

In my testing, I dropped my CPU multi to 8x, and HT multi to 5x, to make sure those bottlenecks are eliminated.

I used memset 4.0 to find out the sub timings (tWR, tRRD, etc..) for 1066mhz off the SPD, and tried to enter each settings accordingly, because leaving them on AUTO results in too tight a timing than these sticks can handle.

A few timings are beyond what is permitted by the bios. IE. tWR maximum of 8 allowed, SPD wants 13.

I was then able to post consistently at 1066mhz, but memtest still errors out very fast. Loosening various timings made no difference in stability. Different combination of voltages did nothing either.

The *only* thing that made any difference is going from tRFC=195ns to tRFC=327ns, which marginally improved stability. If the bios allowed looser timings, that may be all I need to run stably, but alas the latest bios doesn't give me that option.

At this point, I can only hope that Asus releases a new bios that permits looser timings.

[Avenger]

Hi @all,

I have an Asus M3A78 Pro mainboard running with a Phenom X4 9950 BE @3.0 GHz and the same memory shown here in the thread.

To be honest:
It's difficult and time-consuming to find out about the correct memory settings because nobody really gives a clear instruction how to set up the memory in the BIOS. So I googled alot and I could setup my timing settings to a stable setting finally.

The only settings I modified from the original settings (at the M3A78 Pro) are:

At Advanced Settings:

AI Overclocking: Overclock Profile
- Overclock options: Disabled

- Processor frequency multiplier: 15x (3.0 GHz for 9950 BE - stable!)
- DRAM Voltage: 2.05 V (as described by G.Skill)

Memory Configuration (submenu)
- DRAM Ganged mode: Enabled

DRAM Timing Configuration (submenu)
- Memory Clock Mode: Manual (Auto or SPD don't really work)
- Memclock Value: 1067 MHz
- DRAM Timing Mode: Both

DCT0 1st:
- CAS Latency (CL): 5 CLK
- TCWL: 5 CLK
- TRCD: 5 CLK
- TRP: 5 CLK
- TRAS: 15 CLK
- tWR: 6 CLK
- tRFC0: 127.5ns
- tRFC1: 75ns
- tRFC2: 75ns

DCT0 2nd:
- tRFC3: 75ns
- TRC: 25 CLK
- TRRD: 4 CLK
- tWTR: 4 CLK
- tRTP: 3-5 CLK

- DCT1 1st and 2nd: All on Auto

With these settings my system is running stable at the moment.

Are there any comments about the settings??? I'm not really a specialist on these settings - so I am grateful for any hint!

By the way:
BIOS on my M3A78 Pro:
v0902

The versions 1001 and 1105 were not stable with my CPU multiplier 15x - also not at many other users! I haven't tried the latest release (which should work again referering to the user feedback).

[GSKILL TECH]

Everything looks good. Try DRAM Ganged mode: Disabled, that should give you a slight boost.

Thank you
GSKILL SUPPORT

[Avenger]

Why should I disable the Ganged Mode? Isn't it an advantage to run in Ganged mode? What should be the advantage of Unganged Mode?

Best regards,
Avenger

[GSKILL TECH]

Ganged mode is combining memory controllers to operate as one against the CPU cores. By setting it to unganged, it splits the memory controllers thus allowing them to operate on their own against the CPU cores. Although Ganged mode would theoretically be better or faster, the current technology is still better at 2 x 64 rather than 1 x 128. For example, if you need to paint a small house, is it better with two people or one big strong guy? Although the big strong guy may be better at some areas, it is still faster to paint the house with two people. haha that's the best I can explain it in simple terms. Let me know if you have any further questions.

Thank you
GSKILL SUPPORT