What should my timings be?

Hey all I just bought 2 sticks of Kingston Value Ram

KVR333X64C25/256 256mb DDR333 PC2700 CL2.5 ram

just wondering what I should put my settings at for best ocing performance
i'm having trouble getting past 166 mhz frequency

i have an AMD Athlon XP 1800+ Tbred
and Asus A7N8X-Deluxe thanks for any help

The official frequency for a DDR333 PC2700 Cas 2.5 module is 167 MHz. You won't be happy at that frequency but cannot complain neither. 5-10% overclock is usually possible if the memory is not itself overclocked, so you should be able to get it to 170-180 MHz (hopefully).

Also increase the bios default RAM voltage to 2.8 V may help. Some would do Vram mod on the MB to get even higher memory speed.

Set USER DEFINE for the bios memory setting, set it to 6-3-3-2 as a starting point. Set the FSB in SYNC mode with the memory. Lower the CPU multiplier so that CPU would not go out of its stable working range during the FSB overclocking.

Increase the FSB few steps at a time (or 1 MHz when close to top) until the OS begins not to boot, then you will know roughly what is the top speed of your system. Then you can backoff 1 MHz at a time, so that the OS and applications are stable. 3D mark 2001 is a good and quick test for stability. This is the top stable memory speed of your system.

A7N8X FSB top speed can range between 180-220 MHz (w/o Vdd mod for NorthBridge). When you use PC2700, memory may be the limiting factor. But go w/ the PC2700 first, before going to buy expensive memory.

Then try to tighten the memory timing to 5-2-2-2 as a goal. You may not be able to achieve that without dropping the FSB a lot. There is an optimal point and balance between the bus frequency and memory timing. Between 6-3-3-2 and 5-2-2-2 is about 5 MHz of memory/FSB frequency (roughly speaking), pick the best tradeoff when you get there. Memory bandwidth can be measured by SiSoft 2003.

After you get the max FSB for system, then you can play with the CPU multiplier. May have to make delta change (+-) on FSB to finalize between TWO adjacent multiplier settings such that the CPU frequency is as close to its top as possible in order to fully optimize the system.

After you've done all these. If indeed memory is the limiting factor, you can run ASYNC dual channel mode 75% or 80% to find out the max FSB of the MB. And decide whether to upgrade your memory at that point, or just run ASYNC dual channel mode to boost system performance (to some where between max FSB and the slower memory freq) with the existing memory.

Hope this helps.

wow
excellent reply thanks for taking the time to write that
i'm sure it will help me greatly!!!!

i actually finally got my cpu and mem to run sync at 166 mhz after upping the voltage to 1.75...now i'll try the mem timings etc. like you told me and see what happens
thanks again take care

After you get your system stable to run in SYNC and tighter timing. I suggest you to find out the max FSB of your system by testing it with ASYNC mode dual channel (remember DIMM1 and DIMM3).

You have to set the ASYNC ratio appropriately such that both the memory speed (at certain timing) and FSB speed won't exceed their limits. Then increase FSB slowly step by step like before to find the top FSB speed (with memory and FSB running in ASYNC). I wrote about it in another post.

DEPENDING on how high your FSB can go, it may help the memory bandwidth and 3D performance further using your existing memory. A7N8X FSB can go between 180-230 MHz (depends on "luck", actually is NB Vdd to most believe).

E.g. if you find out FSB can go as high as 200+ MHz (when running your RAM around at 166 MHz ASYNC), you may be able to boost performance like running memory at ~187 MHz (PC3000) using PC2700. Close to within 5-8% what people get using expensive PC3200 memory.

well. a lot of stuff to read, but not all is the best advice. most of it is right on, but I would not EVER run my system async for genearl use. the performance gain minimal to negative. if you are ONLY doing it to see the max of your board, go ahead, but not for your final settings.

What MB and memory are you using? Is it dual channel? What is the FSB speed?

First you need a MB with dual channel. In order for dual channel to help performance, the FSB frequency has to be much higher than the memory frequency and run them in ASYNC. This is true for both Intel and AMD MB.