Crosshair V Formula/Thunderbolt memory selection

[Biggerguy]

After too long a wait I finally have to do a full system upgrade. I have pushed my old reliable NF7-S v2 past its limits and it's obsolescence is now costing me potential work. I use my PC for everything, not just games.

I am sticking with an AMD system and am building up my parts list to make the big purchase.

I have looked in the Asus site, as well as their Qualified DDR3 vendor List yet I am still confused.

I want to run 16GB, of the fastest memory I can, as far as I can see on their list it only mentions 4GB for the DDR 2133, and only mentions 16GB in DDR3 1600 flavor. Does this mean that I can only use 16GB if its DDR3 1600, specifically by Geil?

 

[ssjwizard]

In theory you could possibly get 2133 to run on 2 8GB sticks but I wouldnt count on it(yet) and unfortunately using all 4 memory slots will cost you some of your upper end on the IMC. According to AMDs official specs the FX IMC is only rated for 1866 x 2 sticks or 1600 by 4 sticks. I would say you might reasonably run 1866 x 4 sticks but I wouldnt expect it to do 2133.

 

[Biggerguy]

Thank you for the reply. So you think I will lose performance with more memory?

 

[ssjwizard]

My recommendation would be to get a 2x4GB 1866 kit with decent timings and in a few years when DDR3 is being abandoned and 2x8GB 2133 or higher ram is common upgrade to 16GB if you think you need it. Im running 8GB on my FX-8120 rig and as of yet I havent pushed more then 5GB memory usage and that was with firefox open with multiple tabs, patching dragon saga from the web, installing starcraft 2 from the DVD, and playing spore, all while streaming music off of DI.FM in VLC.

 

[Woomack]

I had no problems running 1, 2 or 4 sticks @2133+ without any lose of stability on CHV.
Here some tests with 16GB G.Skills 1600+ / 4 slots that are overclocking the same using 2 and 4 sticks and overall clock is higher than on P67 boards for which they're designed.
Lately I'm using 4 sticks of Dominator GT / PSC 2000 C8 that are working fine @2133 9-10-9 ~1.6V on this board. Only difference is that 4 sticks need command rate 2T and 2 sticks can usually run on 1T ( depends which IC ).
Other thing is that there is no point to use faster memory than 1866 as you wont see any difference because of really limited memory controller.
All these results are possible with FX cpus and new memory controllers.

Here is 2650MHz with memory still on standard air cooling.
IMC limit seems about 2300-2400MHz for air/water cooling.
I haven't seen any 2133 or higher kits designed for FX so for most you will have to set some timings manually.

Optimal will be something 2x or 4x 4GB 1866 CL9 that won't be too expensive and can use about max of IMC bandwidth on air/water ( that is something near 2500-2600MHz CPU-NB ).

 

[Biggerguy]

Again thanks for the replies.

From the age of my current PC you can tell that I more than fully utilize the lifespan of my hardware. I believe in part this has to do with me having bought the best that existed at the time, allowing for nearly 10years use (albeit with upgrades along the way); its only in the past year that I am see an actual need to start fresh. I hope to do about the same with this new system, so I am building it a bit over kill, not drastically because that would be cost prohibitive.

This is my reasoning for loading up with 16GB. I am hoping to build a system that can handle anything I can currently throw at it as well as what I will be throwing at it in the coming years. I have chosen the best board, and will be using the AMD FX8150.

A bit OT, is it safe to run this chip with air cooling? Namely Thermaltake's, Big Typhoon which when last tested beat out a few liquid coolers and all other air coolers on the market....the thing is a monster. I dont want to get into liquid cooling unless I have to, the way my hands are always in the PC case, I dread the idea of a hose coming lose and water getting on components.

 

[Woomack]

I don't think it's future proof platform but for daily use and gaming it will last for 2-3 years if not more.
About CHV. I don't know if it will be solved soon but don't count on good integrated RAID. There are no cache options in RAID ROM so if you want SSD then better think about something like revodrive or single SSD in AHCI.
I haven't seen any other issues so I can say that board is really good.
I'm using water cooling for gaming and if you are going to overclock to about 4.2-4.5GHz then better think about some custom water set.
Save some money and get FX8120. Chip is the same as 8150 just lower multi ... but it's BE cpu so who cares.

 

[Biggerguy]

Yes I do plan on loading my OS and application on a SSD, and reusing my old 750GB HD for storage.

Immediately I don't plan on OC'ing, since coming from such an old system anything new will be like graduating from a bicycle to driving a Bugatti Veyron. But since I can never leave well enough alone, OC'ing is inevitable.

I remember having lots of memory issues with my current system, it was the single most perplexing task, I had to send back several sets of OCZ memory to finally arrive at a set that worked at the speeds I wanted; matching the right timings with components and capacity. Seems that things have not changed. I might have to give Asus a call to sort this out. How is their customer service?

Is the FX8120 and FX8150, the same difference as the 3200+ vs. XP-M of old? (basically same chip with features disabled or locked with the main difference being the price).

 

[Reefa_Madness]

Is the FX8120 and FX8150, the same difference as the 3200+ vs. XP-M of old? (basically same chip with features disabled or locked with the main difference being the price).

Unlike your XP comparison, where the multi on the 3200 was locked, but not on the XP-M, this is more along the lines of do you buy an XP-M 2500 or a 2600 for your NF7. The differences between the 8120 & 8150 is simply that the latter is binned to a higher default clock, but both have unlocked multipliers you can run them both at the same clocks and they would perform the same. The higher default binning only makes a difference in a situation where the motherboard/BIOS does not provide for tinkering. Your choice of motherboard would allow you to set the multiplier to the same on either processor.

 

[PolRoger]

Is the FX8120 and FX8150, the same difference as the 3200+ vs. XP-M of old? (basically same chip with features disabled or locked with the main difference being the price).

I see Reefa beat me to it... but...

The FX-8120/8150 have the same design but the 8150 most likely has a slightly better bin as well as a higher stock multi. Both are fully unlocked and they seem to clock in a similar fashion. Some samples have a higher VID and run a bit cooler while others run hotter and are a bit challenging to cool especially when overclocked.

 

[ssjwizard]

I have an 8120 on water cooling right now and Ive takin it up to 5.3ghz(very unstable) and run 4.6ghz 24/7 clocks @ 1.35v 8GB of mushkin ddr3-1600 @ 1866 9-9-9-26-2T all of that on the meek gigabyte 990XA-UD3 so im sure you will like either CPU.

 

[Reefa_Madness]

I see Reefa beat me to it... but...

One of those now rare posts outside the Classifieds section...

 

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