Help me out w/OC'ing memory..

Just put together new system running a locked XP 2000+ on SOLTEK SL-75DRV5 mobo with CORSAIR XMS CMX512-3200 512MB PC3200 DDR RAM. I am very new to overclocking RAM. I would appreciate any tips you could give me. Thanks!

When you overclock your CPU you will overclock the RAM also. I don't know if the RAM is on the FSB but the RAM will be affected if you change the FSB. Good luck.

lowering your multiplier and raising your fsb will give you more boost than changing the multiplier only..

BuccKevin said:

lowering your multiplier and raising your fsb will give you more boost than changing the multiplier only..

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Thats the trick:

using a 1000mhz cpu as an example with an FSB of 100mhz (to make my math easier)

a mulitplier of 10x would be default. If you unlocked and went to an 11x multi, the cpu would be at 1100mhz, but the bus speed would still be 100 mhz.

If you dropped to a 9x multi and raised fsb to 122, then you would have a 1098mhz cpu on a 122mhz fsb. Since all the components in the computer use the Front Side Bus to communicate with the cpu, everything else would be considerably faster- and the computer would BE a LOT faster.

Memory is included in that- everything is: pci bus, agp and memory.

Sometimes this causes problems in that some components do not like to run out of spec (high fsb); also, some boards are better at it than others.

The most recent boards are coming out with 1/5 divisors to help keep the pci bus in spec: at 180mhz fsb with a 1/4 divisor (older mobos max) anything connected to the pci bus had to operate at 45 mhz, when spec is 33mhz.
Hope that helps......

As mentioned, your memory runs at the same speed your FSB runs at. For example, your FSB is 150, your memory is 150. If your FSB is too high some boards will have a divider kick in, and your memory will be usually 3/4. The divider of the memory is usually increasing the memory speed instead of lowering it since there are newer chipset which provide more dividers keeping things in spec and easier to maintain.

Keep in mind that overclocking FSB is much easier, in this case you would have to unlock your CPU to drop the multiplier to up the FSB to make use of what you paid for (PC3200 ram). FSB increases everything, PCI Bus (HDDs, CD-Roms, PCI Cards), AGP Bus (Video cards) and other things. . . Multiplier just changes the clock speed of the CPU and it can't really be raised much and only the CPU benefits from this. You wouldn't see much of a difference because other parts like ram and all that are still running how they would.

Usually when overclocking ram, you want to see the latency down to as low as possible. Lower latency gives the ram better performance, and makes the system more responsive and faster. When you reach a real high FSB, you might not be able to achieve such a low latency anymore as the memory just can't take it. In this case your memory is rated PC3200 (200fsb) CAS2.5. I'm pretty sure it could do PC3000 (184fsb) CAS2-2-2 easily w/ other turbo timings because Corsair is a respectable ram company.

Last:

PC1600 = 100fsb
PC2100 = 133fsb
PC2400 = 150fsb (Me thinks, not sure)
PC2700 = 166fsb
PC3000 = 184fsb
PC3200 = 200fsb

I tried to explain the best I can. Don't heisitate to ask questions, as I kind of went a little overkill.

Yodums said:

PC2400 = 150fsb (Me thinks, not sure)

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Correct