ARES F3-2133C9Q-16GAB Faulty?

[kibwah]

Hi all

I'm in need of help with my recently upgraded system. I suspect my ram may be faulty.

Specs are:

Asrock Xtreme9 x79
i7 3930k
ARES F3-2133C9Q-16GAB
Gigabyte gtx 680
Corsair H80 Cooler
Seasonic 1000w platinum PSU

Firstly I am unable to get the system stable when running the ram at it's advertised spec (2133mhz 9-11-10-2N) 1.65v). When running prime95 i get rounding errors, sometimes within 10 minutes other times after an hour, seems completely random when the errors occur. This happens when processor is at stock clocks or overclocked. I tested today with xmp setting in bios set to 'standard' as oppose to 'xmp-1' 'xmp-2' or 'auto', and was prime stable for 11 hours with no errors.

Also occasionally while playing bf3 the game crashes (game freezes and a weird, short buzz sound comes out of speakers, then crashes to desktop). The application is still running in task manager but the system is unresponsive until close the application through task manager. Could this be ram related?

Thx in advance for your help

[GSKILL TECH]

Make sure to set DRAM frequency, timings, and voltage. In addition, VCCSA may need to go up a little to stabilize 4 modules of DDR3-2133.

That should be all that's needed. You can test 2 modules at a time to see if they can perform at DDR3-2133, it should be easier since less voltage is necessary.

Thank you
GSKILL TECH

[kibwah]

Thank you for the reply

Sorry i forgot to mention i have tried setting voltage and timings manually (9,11,10.28 1.65v). I havent set vccsa though. What should i set it to?

[Tradesman]

Rather than jump around alot (up and down) I'd set it to 1.15 and then work it down .01 at a shot while maintaining stability, with your rig I'd guess in the vicinity of +/- 1.11

[kibwah]

Ok thx ill try this tonight.

Should this voltage stay the same whether processor is overclockedor not? Ive currently got mine set to 4.4ghz.

Cheers

[Tradesman]

Generally the VCCSA is normally good at stock (auto setting) until you get up into high performance/high freq/16GB and up....oonce DRAM is stable you can normally increase the OC without change up to about +/- 4.8. On some systems at 4.9 and up I've had to increase it a bit more, the biggest need for a jump is when you OC and throw in 32GB DRAM

[kibwah]

Setting frequency, timings and voltage manually and vccsa to 1.15 resulted in rounding errors in Prime95 blend test after 5 minutes or so. Should I increase vccsa untill its stable?

[kibwah]

Vccsa @ 1.16 and still same rounding error after 6 minutes.

[kibwah]

How about vtt should that be set manually as well? I've set that at 1.24ish and it seems to have helped. Managed to run prime for 34 minutes before errors started to occur.

[Tradesman]

Can try leaving the VTT there or maybe dropping it a bit and go ahead and try VCCSA at 1.2

[kibwah]

As of now im up to vtt 1.35ish and vccsa 1.3ish and still getting rounding errors. So far the only setting ive been able to achieve no errors has been xmp setting set to standard, however when its set to standard I get frequent video driver crashes while gaming and runnin 3dmark11.

[Tradesman]

Do you have the latest BIOS and/or have you checked with the manufacturer for info on the mobo. Might try running Memtest on each stick by itself to see if one is bad, those voltages are way to high

[kibwah]

I have the latest bios. What info on the mobo should I be looking for? The memory isn't on the compatibility list but I didn't think it would matter since it's newer release from gskill. Ill try running individual sticks after work tonight, think I might also try runnning 4 sticks at lower frequency with the original voltages you suggested. If I can get it stable at lower frequency ill be happy, performance won't be affected much and I only got the kit because it was blue anyway lol

[Tradesman]

Let us know, I'll be in and out the next few hours

[kibwah]

I appear to be stable @ 1866mhz 9-11-10-28-2N 1.65v, with vccsa @ 1.17 and vtt @1.24. No errors running Prime95 blend test for over 11 hours and I haven't had any video driver crashes yet...

Id be happy to run @ 1866mhz rather than RMA the ram. Thoughts?