Ram overclocking question

[Jeff G]

Previously, I had a 6700k @4.8ghz on a z170 Gaming 7 board paired with 2x8gb Team 3000mhz c16 ram.
I picked up the z270x Gaming 8 that Austin reviewed on here. I took the opportunity of tearing down my system to also swap out some of my water cooling gear.
Fast forward and I put the same 6700k and same Team 2x8gb ram on the Gaming 8 board. Dialed my cpu overclock in (4.9ghz 100% 24/7 stable with max temps of 58C after hours of various benching/stability testing).
I tried enabling the xmp of my ram, which is what I used on the z170, and it wouldnt boot. Loaded the factory defaults and tried to enable xmp with stock cpu settings, it eventually booted but crashed anytime a memory intensive load was applied. Added a little voltage and loosened the timings a bit and I can get it to stabily boot at stock cpu. Add in any overclock and it immediately crashes again.

So, I'm at a bit of a loss as to what to try. With my overclock, I cant boot above 2133mhz on any voltage or timings (I didnt try going too high on either though).
Any advice on what to troubleshoot? Also, the board is on the most recent bios too. I want to make sure I'm not missing something easy before I tear apart my loop that I just finished

 

[EarthDog]

Try adding System agent voltage. Not all boards respond the same to xmp.

 

[Jeff G]

Try adding System agent voltage. Not all boards respond the same to xmp.

Thanks, I'll give that a try! This board has a ton more options than the Gaming 7 did. I tried googling them, but lots of conficting info out there.

 

[wingman99]

If you have some questions about the Gigabyte BIOS I may be able to help. Do you have the latest BIOS version?

 

[Jeff G]

If you have some questions about the Gigabyte BIOS I may be able to help. Do you have the latest BIOS version?

The board is on the latest bios, F9c.
I cant get it to boot xmp with even pretty high voltages unless I chamge "Memory Enhancement Settings" from normal to either "improved stability" or "relaxed". What exactly is this setting?

 

[wingman99]

Memory Enhancement Settings is for changing secondary memory timings.

 

[Jeff G]

Memory Enhancement Settings is for changing secondary memory timings.

Well, it doesnt want to boot on "Normal" either way. Google shows 1.4v for ram, 1.2v for VCCIO, and 1.25v for system agent to be a good ceiling for 24/7 usage. Wont boot at those voltages (everything else is at stock speeds/voltages right now).

 

[wingman99]

Well if it will run well on the relaxed timings of "improved stability" that is all you need to do. Those voltages are fine for 24/7.

 

[Jeff G]

Well, it wont even boot 3000mhz/c16 on "Normal".
But, I'm up to 3200mhz/c16 on "Improved Stability".
Cant say I fully understand ram.

 

[wingman99]

Well, it wont even boot 3000mhz/c16 on "Normal".
But, I'm up to 3200mhz/c16 on "Improved Stability".
Cant say I fully understand ram.

Well that is fine if PC is stable. It's just a little slower in memory benchmarks going from "Normal" to "Improved Stability"

 

[Jeff G]

Wouldnt boot any higher than 3200mhz even at cl18, or any lower than cl16 at 3000. My best guess is the ram is sorta sub-par (it is like 5 years old and was cheap even back then).
Either way, thanks to you guys for helping me on a nice ram refresh course and getting this up and running!

 

[wingman99]

For overclocking memory you could try increasing the memory voltage from 1.35v to 1.45v.

 

[Jeff G]

One last question on this.
With the troubles I had getting this stable at 3000mhz, is it more likely to be the ram as a problem or the board or the cpu? With ram coming down, I'm wondering if it makes sense to grab a 2x8 kit with a 3600/c17 or 3733/c17 xmp to replace this one. It seems stable so far running 3000/c16 with the "improved stability" settings, but I did have to up the volts. Just wondering if I'll run in to the same thing with new/ different ram (Id like to switch to "normal" from "improved stability" too)

 

[EarthDog]

I wouldn't pay to upgrade your memory speed. If you need the capacity, sure. But othewise, unless you are rocking and AMD Ryzen CPU, you will not see a lot of performance gains un upgrading speeds from 3K to 3.6K.

 

[Jeff G]

I wouldn't pay to upgrade your memory speed. If you need the capacity, sure. But othewise, unless you are rocking and AMD Ryzen CPU, you will not see a lot of performance gains un upgrading speeds from 3K to 3.6K.

I am rocking a Ryzen as well, but thats got 3400mhz/c17 ram in it already (dont know if the step from that to 3600mhz/c17 would be worth it either).
Mostly, just want to make sure the looser subtimings from the "imprived stability" setting and higher voltage wont hinder me too much with the 3000mhz/c16 stuff on the 6700k.

 

[EarthDog]

I can't imagine that is remotely worth it honestly.

 

[Jeff G]

Back to this. Started having issues again, memtest found errors immediately.
I can go error free in a run of all 13 memtests tests at 3000mhz/cl16 with super loose secondary/sub-timings, but still get a random crash if I game for more than an hour. Also feels super sluggish at times now that it's running loose timings.
I'm thinking it's time to put these to pasture on the htpc at stock speeds (currently running just 8gb on the htpc). I was holding off until ram prices came down, and they're getting cheap now.
For a rig that is a dedicated gaming rig, any difference between 3200/cl16 vs 3200/cl14 vs 3600/cl16? The prices arent as far off as they used to be, does it make sense to grab faster ram for the extra $30-40 if I'm replacing anyway? And are we still at a point where 16gb is good, or is 32gb the new recommended size? Been about 5 years since I've had to buy ram.

 

[Alaric]

The board is on the latest bios, F9c.
I cant get it to boot xmp with even pretty high voltages unless I chamge "Memory Enhancement Settings" from normal to either "improved stability" or "relaxed". What exactly is this setting?View attachment 205628

My Giga BIOS (Z170) has a "performance" option there. That's where mine is set and the only one of three that it will run my OC settings on.

 

[Jeff G]

My Giga BIOS (Z170) has a "performance" option there. That's where mine is set and the only one of three that it will run my OC settings on.

I have Performance, Normal, Improved Stability, and Relaxed OC. I couldnt get the ram to boot at xmp on Performance or Normal, no matter voltages. Improved Stability worked well until recent, now I'm on Relaxed OC just to not have errors at xmp. This ram is from the first batch of ddr4, I was an early adopter as my old amd 965 was showing it's age finally and skylake/ddr4 seemed like the time to jump in. It has been run pretty hard over the last few years, and I think it's just getting to that time where it needs to be replaced. Seems like it's been going downhill slowly over the last year, from running higher than xmp, to only being able to run xmp, to now having super loose secondary timings just to run xmp.

 

[Alaric]

I could barely get past 3600 MHz on anything setting than performance. When I set it to performance I could hit 3866 MHz with no issues (17-18-18) but the voltage was too close to 1.55v so I backed it down to 3733 MHz @15-16-16 and it's been solid there ever since.

edit: I learned a lot OC'ing my RAM. I'm far from a memory guru (That would be Woomack), but my thread is here https://www.overclockers.com/forums/showthread.php/787371-3866-MHz-Too-much-is-enough and everything is pretty well documented for my Gigabyte/Z170 Gaming 7 set up.