Any thoughts on OC potential of A8N versus DFI?

[bneiderman]

Just curious on peoples thoughts on this. It seems BIOS configuration by the manufacturer can make a huge difference. OR, is this component related? I see many like me have the OCZ Platinum Rev. 2 ram that Anand took to 318 on the DFI board. I would sure like to take advantage of this RAM on my A8N too. Throw some thoughts around here.

 

[GuitarDaddy]

I have the same ram, and an A8N-SLI. Unless ASUS fixes it with a bios update this board is limited to Ram speed of 240-250mhz 1T. I can run ram @290mhz 2T, but the performance hit of using 2T is too great for the higher ramspeed to offset. Otherwize this board overclocks very well. With the 3200+ I,m running 2.6ghz w/ram @ 236mhz 2-3-3-5.

Until ASUS fixes this ram limitation, the DFI board has an advantage overclocking the RAM. However on the A64 platform ram speed doesn't affect performance greatly, as it does with Intel systems or even older AMD systems.

 

[PascalT]

http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=2330&p=3

memory speed does affect the amd64.. more than you might think.

 

[bneiderman]

So Guitardaddy, I take it, your FSB speed is higher than your ram speed? Did you set some lesser multiple so that the RAM would not supercede the 240 limitation? I am kind of new to overclocking but thought the RAM ran at FSB speeds unless a lesser multiplier was set. Can you give me your settings? Thanks!

 

[GuitarDaddy]

You are correct. I'm using the 6:5 mem divider, on this board its called "Max memory clock" and the setting is DDR333. And yes I have to run this way because of the limitation, I can run 1:1 @289mhz 2T but the performance is less than 236mhz 1T

9x289=2601mhz vcore 1.57v HTT multi = 3x 3x289=867FSB
DDR333 ram=236mhz(DDR472) 2-3-3-5(auto) 1T(manual) 2.80v(manual)
idle temp=40c full load(prime95)=52c

 

[GuitarDaddy]

Originally posted by: PascalT
http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=2330&p=3

memory speed does affect the amd64.. more than you might think.

Yes HL2 and I will add 3dmark05 show a 5-10% gain, but most everything else very little.

 

[PascalT]

True enuf, but that is a good indicator of what is to come in terms of games and their needs.