Ram gets erros in memtest in one mobo, is fine in another. WHY?

[Wolfmist]

In my old rig, I have a 1900xp (locked), and Asus a7v266e (via 266a), and corsair 2100 from way back when it was the fastest stuff. I always thought it was what was holding my 1900xp from going any higher than 140 fsb, until I put the ram in my NF7-s mobo and gave it a test in memtest86.

It got it all the way to 160 fsb, with no memtest errors.
In the via 266 board, even at the loosest timings at default 133 fsb speeds, I still still get 13 or so errors after the first two tests. Increasing the FSB obviously raises their occurance.

Now, I'm pretty new to using memtest, but their website said that some Mobos just don't jive with certain ram. On the other hand though, these were both top of the line stuff at the time. Not cheap stuff.

Is there any way I can get rid of the errors? And 140 fsb (1680mhz) a normal overclock for a 1900xp?

BTW, the a7v266e's bios is version 1011 and there are no voltage settings for the ram.

[johan851]

Well, it could be a couple of things. Like you mentioned, the lack of RAM voltage might be limiting a higher overclock. Also, different chipsets treat RAM differently, and some chipsets deal with higher FSBs better than others. The KT266A might be imposing some different timings/settings/latencies etc. on the memory, while the nForce2 is being a little easier (or a little more efficient) with it. Obviously, an nForce2 is much better at FSB overclocking than a KT266A.

It could also have something to do with dividers. With the KT266A's unlocked PCI/AGP buses, Memtest could be picking up errors from devices run out of spec. FYI, ATi cards deal poorly with higher AGP buses, while nVidia cards tend to do better.

All in all...the KT266A just wasn't designed to shoot for incredibly high FSBs, and might just not be a terrifically stable platform for overclocking. The KT266A might just be limiting the overall CPU core clock.

[Wolfmist]

Yeah, but errors even when not overclocked at all, and looser than normal timings? They're not a huge amount , like 11 or so in the first 3 tests, but more than none. It also has never been a completely stable system. Its not unusable, but not completely rock solid with wierd quirks every now and then.

I really want to see what that chip can do. I failed at trying to unlock it before, but I think I might try again, as that would be the only way of overclocking everything and not upsetting the delicate FSB. What a waste with ram though! Its practically PC2700.