Gigabyte P35 DS3P DDR voltages

[Rebel50]

I have set up a new system using a GA P35 DS3P with Corsair PC 6400 C4 ram which is supposed to run at 2.1 volts.

Since the "standard" DDR2 volts is 1.8 - 1.9, does the motherboard automatically set the DDR volts to 2.1 with this RAM - or do I have to raise the volts in the bios (+0.2 setting) ??

Also I cant seem to find any way of checking the actual DDR volts - are there any apps that can do this?


What overclock are these chips capable of running - they are version 2.1 which uses Promos chips I believe.

Regards

 

[jda104]

also curious about this

 

[Rebel50]

I looks as tho the Gigabyte EasyTune app displays DDR voltages (VDIMM) - I will check it out when I get home later.

 

[lenjack]

The board will default to 1.8. You need to add 0.3v in bios.

 

[Rebel50]

Thanks for the input - yes I thought the board would use the default voltage, but had no way of checking.

EasyTune 5 does give the VDimm voltage in "Advanced Mode" - not sure how accurate it is but at least its a guide.

At least the board boots OK with voltage default settings.

At +0.3v I am running the RAM at DDR1066 with 5-5-5-15 settings and no memtest errors, not bad for Promos chips.

Regards

 

[talz13]

So did your 2.1V corsair allow you to boot alright at the default 1.8V? I'm looking to get similar corsair memory and a ds3p and wanted to make sure it would boot...

 

[DSF]

Originally posted by: talz13
So did your 2.1V corsair allow you to boot alright at the default 1.8V? I'm looking to get similar corsair memory and a ds3p and wanted to make sure it would boot...

If it doesn't boot, you can always try booting with just one stick, which it should be able to do, and then going into the BIOS and upping the voltage.

Honestly though, why get RAM that needs 2.1V? Even if you're OCing a CPU to a FSB of 400, that means DDR2-800 is within spec. It's not hard to find DDR2-800 that runs at 1.8V.

 

[talz13]

Well, I was looking at some A-Data ram, but then today I found that the corsair XMS2 ram had a $40 rebate (I haven't had a bad rebate yet) which made it cheaper. However, the XMS2 was listed as 2.1V under its specs, whereas the A-Data had the normal 1.8V listed. The XMS2 would sound like better overclocking ram, but being cheaper after rebate had more impact on my choice.

 

[tenax]

well, the xms2 doesn't "need" 2.1 volts, but it will love it. i have a set of 5300 corsair xms2 that will easily run 6400 at 1.9 volts. i have them paired with some new munchkin 6400 and they will all easily run well past the stock 333 and 400 together..475, 485 at 2.1 volts. the nice thing i've felt after running corsair sticks for a number of years is their ratings are always conservative in terms of their performance..you know you're getting a very conservative rating for the buck in terms of speed and how tight timings you can run, versus some moderately cheaper sticks that are spec'ed at their top end of overclocking with 2.1 voltage. the corsair is always a treat (the xms2 sticks anyway..i do have a pair of value corsair ram in my sons computer, moderately overclocked it once for kicks..i suspect the value ram you get a more true to rated spec performance level)

 

[Mondoman]

I agree with tenax's assessment. Too bad OCZ doesn't follow the same policy as Corsair.

 

[Billbo]

Doesn't speedfan show you the DDR voltage? It does for the DS3L but it's labelled as Vcore2. And it shows the same value as in the bios Health Status screen.

 

[tenax]

i'll be so bold as to say, agree or disagree..that given the price of memory these days, there's no reason to buy anything but corsair..years ago when memory was just plain pricey and there weren't so many brands available, i used to buy crucial and considered it kind of a poor man's memory but it was stable and it ran fine and a lot of people were using it..corsair, mushkin were the kings of the hill. what anyone who wanted top tier memory purchased. i've never had mushkin until the 2 sticks i have now..it doesn't disappoint..but once i started buying corsair, i kept buying corsair cause it never let me down, no matter the type, no matter the speed..it always did what i wanted it to do.. to save 10 bucks in exchange for potential grief with some other memory brands i won't mention given i know that many people have had superb results with those brands, is just not worth the saving. and the ramguy over at corsair is the first memory company rep i ever saw with a forum..and gave good advice and information. greg at mushkin is an awesome guy as well as the rest of the guys at the mushkin forum who support, and they truly care about the customer in my experience and don't make excuses for their memory.
we have a saying in my business we live by..underpromise, overdeliver..i believe that's what companies like mushkin do really well.

i'll step off my soapbox now, i've said my piece