Corsair XMS 3200 won't run at 200MHz

[VanTheMan]

So, I've been doing some overclocking to increase my performance in Oblivion. Here's my Oblivion thread for some background information.

Basically, my PC3200 RAM will not run at 200MHz. It's Corsair XMS Platinum, so I assume it should run at advertised speed, if not faster. The highest I have gotten it to successfully function at is 183MHz. I set the RAM to DDR400 and 2.5 3 3 8 in BIOS and, even with the CPU frequency and multiplier at stock 200x10, the system would not POST and gave me an audible "System failed memory test" notification on reboot.

I also tried running it at DDR333 (5:6 divider) and clocking the CPU differently. I clocked the CPU to 220, which put the RAM at 183, and it ran fine. When I tried setting the CPU to 240, which would put the RAM at 199, it gave me the aforementioned error on reboot.

I'm currently running my CPU @ 270 x9 with the RAM DDR333, so I have 2430MHz CPU and 173MHz RAM. I left Prime95 running for 9.5 hours while I was at work and it did fine.

Any ideas or suggestions would be greatly appreciate as I am stumped.

 

[MadScientist]

You've probably already checked the obvious, but it doesn't hurt to check again.
Are both chips fully seated?
Using slots A1 and B1, the blue ones, for dual mode?
Will it boot with all settings in Dram Config set to Auto and CPU to Auto?
If yes, what did the board set the timings and the DDR voltage to? Do you have the 2-3-3-6, 2-2-2-5, or the 3-3-3-6 platinums?
If no boot, is the DDR voltage set to 2.75V? If not, set it to 2.75V and try again? This is SPD voltage for these chips.
If it still will not boot at 200Mhz, try booting with 1 chip only installed. One of your chips may be bad. I had a very similar problem with 2-512MB Kingston HyperX chips.

Good Luck!!

 

[Zap]

As pointed out you may have CAS 3 XMS. What makes them uber elite and not just another set of ValueRAM, I don't know besides the fancy heatspreaders and higher price. Alternately, you probably have one or two bad sticks of RAM. That happened to me, well, twice kinda. Bought some Corsair XMS3200-C2 or something like that. One stick was completely DOA brand new out of the package. Wouldn't POST at any speed. Second stick worked fine at DDR400 CAS 2. Sent the pair in for RMA because that's what Corsair (The RAM Guy forums) advise. The pair I got back work... but not at "rated" timings. They both can do DDR400, but one stick only at CAS 3 and one at CAS 2.5. These are "rated" at CAS 2. Very dissappointing. So far I haven't felt like wasting more time and money to RMA it since it at least isn't totally dead like that first stick. Besides, the RMA process doesn't guarantee perfect sticks. I had a stick of PQI Turbo that I had to RMA twice. Brand new, was DOA. First RMA got a sealed package, but was also DOA. Second RMA, just got it back and not only does it work perfectly fine at rated speeds of DDR400 CAS 3, also works at CAS 2.5. Still, rather not have paid $7+ twice to RMA them (plus 2 weeks each time).

 

[VanTheMan]

Yeah, I checked all that stuff Mad. When set to auto, it sets them to 2.5-3-3-7 and 2.6v and boots fine. I do them have running dual channel, but they are not a matched pair. The rated timing on one is 2-3-2-6 and 2.5-3-3-8 on the other, according to CPU-Z. I've tried booting them with the vRAM at 2.8 because that's what Corsair says the safe limit is. I don't think I'll try any higher because I don't think extra voltage will help. I'll try booting with one stick at a time to see if I can get either one to run at DDR400 at rated latency. If not, I guess I should post on the RAM Guy forums to try for an RMA. These modules are several years old, so I don't have receipts or anything. Is that likely to be a problem? I see they have a 10 year warranty, hopefully they'll hook me up. BTW, I have never run this RAM at DDR400. My previous motherboard would only do DDR333 and after the first time I had problems trying DDR400 on this computer, I just ran it at DDR333. Thanks guys.

 

[VanTheMan]

I clocked everything at stock speeds (no OCing whatsoever) and tested each stick by itself. Both sticks boot into XP at DDR400 with 2-3-3-6 timings, so I guess they're both ok. I'll try them in dual channel mode again to see if anything was magically fixed. Any ideas?

 

[VanTheMan]

Ok, I was kidding about the the magical fixing, but I've currently got both sticks in running DDR400 (201MHz says CPU-Z) at 2-3-3-6. One thing I thought of is that CPU-Z says 1 stick has an SPD setting for 166MHz and 200MHz, so I put that stick in Slot #2 instead of Slot #1 where it used to be. I wonder if my BIOS was reading that on the first stick and refusing to let them run at DDR400 because of it?

 

[VanTheMan]

It passed memtest86 several times after I bumped it up to 210MHz, so I guess the RAM is good for at least that. Thanks for the help guys.

 

[Yellowbeard]

Originally posted by: VanTheMan
Ok, I was kidding about the the magical fixing, but I've currently got both sticks in running DDR400 (201MHz says CPU-Z) at 2-3-3-6. One thing I thought of is that CPU-Z says 1 stick has an SPD setting for 166MHz and 200MHz, so I put that stick in Slot #2 instead of Slot #1 where it used to be. I wonder if my BIOS was reading that on the first stick and refusing to let them run at DDR400 because of it?

Glad to see you got it working and working well. Good work with the troubleshooting IMO.

OT, issues like this are another reason we don't recommend mixing memory.

 

[VanTheMan]

Thank you. I was glad to find out that my faith in Corsair was not misplaced.

 

[VooDooAddict]

Originally posted by: Zap
As pointed out you may have CAS 3 XMS. What makes them uber elite and not just another set of ValueRAM, I don't know besides the fancy heatspreaders and higher price.

The way it was explained to me by a Corsair rep was that even with the cheaper CAS3 XMS you could be certain you were getting a well designed module as each XMS model had a PCB designed for the memory chips used in that run.

With the Corsair VALUE line ... it was whomever had the cheapest chips for that batch on a vanilla PCB.

No, I don't buy that much memory that I know Corsair reps ... A few years ago, there was a Corsair rep at a Microcenter showing off the LED Modules and their new (at the time) watercooling kit.