G.Skill 2x4GB 1600MHz problem.

CPU: AMD Athlon II X2 260 Regor 3.2GHz
MB: MSI 870A-G54
Memory: G.Skill 8GB (2x4GB 1600MHz)

Before I had the 1600MHz RAM, I had a pair of Corsair XMS3 4GB (2x2GB 1333MHz) that ran just fine, I just wanted to increase the size of my memory. When I had the XMS3s installed, my CPU was OC'd to 3.6GHz, and it was stable, everything ran fine, and it stayed cool. No problems whatsoever. To achieve the 3.6GHz, I increased the front bus speed to 225 rather then the stock 200.

So today I received RAM as a Christmas present. I did a little bit of research before I installed it into my computer, and found out that the 870A-G54 recognizes 1600MHz RAM as overclocked, and that I needed to manually set my timings and stuff, otherwise it would automatically be set to 1333. At this point, I set the timings to 9 9 9 24 and set the DRAM:FSB Ratio to 1:4.


When I installed the G.Skill RAM, I noticed that the MB set it to 1800MHz rather than the specified 1600MHz. So after some toying around in the BIOS, I realized that decreasing the FSB was also decreasing the speed of the RAM (durrrr it totally makes sense now, but I didn't think about it before.)

So my question is, how would I go about OC'ing the CPU but still be able to use the RAM at the specified 1600MHz? Increase the FSB but reduce the ratio to 1.33 or something?

I don't know your board specifically but in your BIOS there is probably a setting for ram speed. Set that to something lower than 1600. There probably is a 1333. As you overclock your fsb you will move the ram speed (and cpu) up with it, hopefully getting to 1600 or close to it.

Being that you are moving to a new set of ram that may have an effect on your system I would start over with your overclock. The limits of your system may have changed with the upgrade.

BugFreak said:

I don't know your board specifically but in your BIOS there is probably a setting for ram speed. Set that to something lower than 1600. There probably is a 1333. As you overclock your fsb you will move the ram speed (and cpu) up with it, hopefully getting to 1600 or close to it.

Being that you are moving to a new set of ram that may have an effect on your system I would start over with your overclock. The limits of your system may have changed with the upgrade.

Click to expand...

The problem with that is the option to set my ram speed is greyed out and doesn't allow me to change it at all. The only thing I can really do is set the FSB and DRAM:FSB Ratio.

Adjusting the FSB/DRAM Ratio setting is the same as changing the DRAM frequency. The Adjusted DRAM Frequency (MHz) value in your BIOS is the result of the FSB/DRAM Ratio setting, which factors in the current HT Ref. clock (CPU FSB frequency). So yes... as you increase the reference clock past 200MHz, you'll want to change from the current 1:4 FSB : DRAM ratio to a more conservative one that results in a lower than rated DRAM frequency; in your case < DDR3-1600.