Looking for the Lowdown on Ballistix Sticks

[mikeyikeey]

Hey everyone,

Time and again I've come here learning more and more about my computer.. but now I'm going to directly ask for help.

I own a pair of Crucial Ballistix Tracers 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500). One of my sticks whacked out, and I'm sending it back for another today.
I just want to know all I can on the subject of these sticks.

What voltage do you have yours at?

What timings? (I'm at 5-5-5-18 on my one stick right now.)

Do you use some sort of cooling on your memory? (I have Corsair Dominators, haven't installed it yet. Should I?)

How high can you set the timings without burning the sticks? (Not having any cooling devices on your memory.)

Whats a safe voltage for the memory? (I've heard the 2.2V Crucial recommends is the maximum, and it can be safely lowered.)

The rest of my parts are as follows:
ASUS P5K-E/WIFI-AP LGA 775 Intel P35
Intel Core 2 Duo E6850 Conroe 3.0GHz 4M shared L2 Cache LGA 775
EVGA GeForce 8800 GTX 768MB
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 (Perpendicular Recording Technology) 320GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s
CORSAIR CMPSU-620HX 620W

All the information you throw at me will be greatly appreciated!
Also, feel free to comment on my posting style. I'm very new here and don't want to upset the community. Thanks again!

 

[n7]

You will likely be getting the new Crucial Ballistix back, which use a different IC than your existing ones.

The new ones are rated for 2.0v, instead of 2.2v.
So check what you get back.

Considering how many Ballistix seem to be failing right & left for people who got them, i'd stick with as low voltage as you can do stably, as less vDIMM might just prolong their life a bit more.

 

[mikeyikeey]

Oh, I only sent in the defective stick. Is it possible to change the voltages for each stick individually?
Its a shame the sticks are failing. When I built this rig a year ago they were recommended and people had high hopes for them!

 

[n7]

What?

They only requested the one defective DIMM from the pair back?

That's a bit messed up...

 

[mikeyikeey]

Ohh crap, am I screwed?

 

[LOUISSSSS]

i dont think theres anything wrong with sending one dimm back, i've done that. at least u get one guaranteed working (that you've tested yourself) DIMM in your PC while u wait. once u get that. i suggest selling the ballistix since it'll be wrapped brand new. theres a high change it'll be DOA. 6 of mine were DOA. gave up the ballistix BS and sold it and got G Skill and its 2 for 2 stable

 

[BonzaiDuck]

I'm not dis-sing what LOUISSSSS says.

I jumped on the Crucial bandwagon in spring '07. I bought DDR2-1000 Ballistix. And I accept more responsibility than most for killing them: I ran them up to 2.175V, tightened the latency timings to the barest, stable minimum, and ran them at a command-rate of 1T. The fact that I was running them considerably below the DDR= 1000 speed-spec didn't matter, because I was stressing the hell out of 'em.

You'll notice that there are Crucial 4GB 2x2GB kits now -- pretty red ones, at that -- tracers and ballistix (only difference is the LEDs). I thought for sure that Crucial was among the last companies to offer 4GB kits. And they don't seem to be too popular, if you rate them by freqency-counts of NewEgg customer-reviewers.

On the other hand -- I've got these re-badged Tracers I picked up from NewEgg for a bargain price, re-labeled "NewEgg LanFest" from a promotion last year. They were selling for some $40+ less than the Tracers of the same spec, but they were definitely Crucials, they were definitely Tracers, they had the same model-code suffix.

. . . . . and as I said elsewhere, I have these (2x1GB) bad-boys runnin' at DDR 875 Mhz and 4,4,4,10,2T, when the spec is DDR 800 Mhz and 4,4,4,12,2T.

[Even so, like the "Hare who lost his spec-tacles" in the Jethro-Tull song . . . . "I bought a spare-ahh-pairrrrr!!" ]

EDIT: Distracted by my own penchant for being cute and witty, I forgot an essential point.

When I RMA'd my DDR2-1000 Ballistix kit, the new kit they sent me wouldn't run at CMD=1T. This doesn't mean that I WANTED to run them at that command-rate, and they had "gone ballistic" and told me "DON'T DOOOOO THAT!! Or we'll send the warranty-police!"

But every brand-new Crucial kit I ever bought would run at 1T -- even to its eventual detriment -- and the replacements simply wouldn't. For this, I suspected they'd been getting so many RMA requests, that they'd taken to binning the returned/defective kits and splitting the pair between the burned-out modules and the "better half." And I suspected that they were repackaging the "better halves" into "kits" and using them to honor the RMA-under-warranty.

 

[LOUISSSSS]

bonzai, what chipset and motherboard did u use to run your ballistix (or any other ram) on 1T? what setting was it called in the bios?

 

[BonzaiDuck]

ASUS Striker Extreme, nVidia 680i chipset.

I'm rather surprised. They board was initially released almost exactly two whole years ago. The latest BIOS revision 1603 was posted two weeks ago -- around August 3 to August 7. They posted it, removed it to their FTP web-site, then posted it again among the BIOS updates for the board.

Somewhere among today's posts I mentioned that I'd picked up two sets of 2x1GB "NewEgg LanFest" (Crucial) DDR2-800s. They're Tracers -- have the same model number, same latency specs -- everything. When they were being sold at the Egg last . . . September? . . . they were about $40 less than the ones that were badged as Crucial Tracers.

I think I got them because they were a "good deal." As good luck -- or bad luck -- would have it, I burned up my DDR2-1000 Ballistix on Christmas Eve, four hours before the family was supposed to arrive for the holiday, and I had planned to make available the machine with a game to play. I popped out the Ballistix and put the Tracers in -- didn't even wait to stress test until after the holiday was over.

But those "Lanfests" -- too -- ran rock-solid with a 1T command-rate. In fact, they were rock-sold at the same voltage I used to run them at 2T and tighter-than-spec latencies. But I took heed of what I was told by Crucial tech-support staff.

The command-rate would be under BIOS "Over-clocking -> Memory timings." I think it is an item after the fourth latency setting or tRAS, and it's just called "Command Rate." I ran Everest Ultimate's memory benchmark, and I think the "Read" score was between 9,750 and 9,850.

Man. I've got spare DDR2 kits coming out the wa-zoo. There's two sets of OCZ Platinum DDR2-800's -- briefly used -- which I'd picked up for $35 a set -- still sitting in my parts lockers.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

Oh, hey!! I just remembered. This came up here on the forums last fall, I think.

Somebody else -- with a P35 chipset -- asked the same thing. I only know -- or remember -- second-hand.

But somebody remarked that you can't adjust the command-rate on that chipset. Now . . . . with X38's or X48's, it may be different. And someone could correct me if I'm wrong about the P35.

 

[mikeyikeey]

Now you're getting too advanced for me. D:
I've only adjusted timings on my sticks, what do command rates do? I feel like I've seen that option in my BIOS..
And.. are you recommending different sticks Bonzai? Are Ballistix not ballasting enough these days? Doesn't seem like it..
Maybe I should take LOUISSSSS's advice and sell the sticks.. go for something newer, better. If thats the case.. whats newer and better!
I've got Vista Ultimate x32 so I don't know how 4 gigs of ram would work in this sucker.. what happens when you put more than 2 gigs in a 32bit version of Windows?
Man.. so many questions. So many answers! Thanks guys!

EDIT: Speaking of new sticks.. these are what I was looking at before these Ballistix sticks.
CORSAIR Dominator 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500)
Looks especially appealing at $49.25 with that $40 rebate.
What do you guys think?

 

[BonzaiDuck]

The best "intelligence" that I have here and from other forums and benchtest sites is this.

You can "use" 4GB with XP, but it won't "show up" as available memory. I need to review whether this is a 32-bit-OS limitation -- meaning that 32-bit VISTA would exhibit the same shortcoming -- or a difference between XP and VISTA. Generally, under the limitation scenario, you end up with between 3 and 3.5GB of "visible" RAM.

If you already have a set of Ballistix and they haven't failed a half-day's stress-testing -- keep 'em! If planning to buy a 2x2GB 4GB kit, you can be adventurous and try the new Crucial kits. As I said, they were last to introduce these 4GB kits into the marketplace. There are too few reviewers to make a sound judgment on that basis alone, and only indicates popularity that may be based on the sorts of failures some of us experienced with the 2GB kits.

But there are a lot of other 4GB kits out there: G.SKILL is one; Corsair is another; Mushkin may offer a 4GB kit.

All I can say at this moment is: despite my own abuse (running the RAM with a 1T command-rate) which PROBABLY contributed to burning out my DDR2-1000 Crucial 2GB kit, I am very pleased with these "NewEgg LanFest" Crucial Tracers. And figure everyone who has burned a module or two is inclined to over-clock, adjust the timings, and even as I've done with these Tracers -- push the speed from the rated spec a little higher. I have these running at 875Mhz now, and even reduced the tRAS timing from 12 to 10.

 

[mikeyikeey]

Well, heres the thing. I had one bad stick.. so I sent it back to Crucial. I was told earlier in this post that I'll be getting a newer stick sent to me, but a customer support person told me the sticks are compatible. Now I'm just worried the stick will be dead on arrival.
So Bonzai, I have one good stick and one newer stick whose status is unknown. The whole situation seems a little sketch to me.. What ever will I do!

 

[Rubycon]

After my experience with tracers I will never do it again. Corsair makes the best ram with the LED's if that's what you want.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

Originally posted by: Rubycon
After my experience with tracers I will never do it again. Corsair makes the best ram with the LED's if that's what you want.

I'm still running the DDR2-800 Tracers rock-stable and error-free, with a Q6600. they're clocked up to DDR=875 and 4,4,4,10 instead of 4,4,4,12 (or looser) with the voltage set to 2.1 or 2.125V. But I hear you, and too many others voicing their dissatisfaction -- and as I said -- I burned out a set of Ballistix myself.

I also agree about the Corsairs. Not only do they seem likely to prove "latency-elastic," but the heatspreaders on those DHX modules are like ANVILS with slots in them for air-flow.

As for Mikey -- I don't know what to tell ya. Just test the suckers. Burn 'em in to see if there's "infant-mortality," and if they survive -- go with 'em.

For me, I always spent the most money on RAM for use in an over-clocking regimen. At the same time, I'd pick up spare sets for testing. I've got a never-used pair of $35/pair OCZ DDR2-800s; the set of RMA-replaced Ballistix, and the spare Tracers. Now I've got the G.SKILL DDR2-1000 4GB kit in addition to a pair of Corsairs.

But DDR2 RAM is dirt-cheap now, so I won't let myself feel like a spendthrifty dumb-dumb. Anyway, the fam-damn-ily will be wanting upgrades this year, or next year, or a couple years from now. The fam-damn-ily isn't that interested in hanging their a** over the over-clocking edge (to paraphrase "the Right Stuff"), so these extra sticks may come in handy.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

Originally posted by: Rubycon
After my experience with tracers I will never do it again. Corsair makes the best ram with the LED's if that's what you want.

I'm still running the DDR2-800 Tracers rock-stable and error-free, with a Q6600. they're clocked up to DDR=875 and 4,4,4,10 instead of 4,4,4,12 (or looser) with the voltage set to 2.1 or 2.125V. But I hear you, and too many others voicing their dissatisfaction -- and as I said -- I burned out a set of Ballistix myself.

I also agree about the Corsairs. Not only do they seem likely to prove "latency-elastic," but the heatspreaders on those DHX modules are like ANVILS with slots in them for air-flow.

As for Mikey -- I don't know what to tell ya. Just test the suckers. Burn 'em in to see if there's "infant-mortality," and if they survive -- go with 'em.

For me, I always spent the most money on RAM for use in an over-clocking regimen. At the same time, I'd pick up spare sets for testing. I've got a never-used pair of $35/pair OCZ DDR2-800s; the set of RMA-replaced Ballistix, and the spare Tracers. Now I've got the G.SKILL DDR2-1000 4GB kit in addition to a pair of Corsairs.

But DDR2 RAM is dirt-cheap now, so I won't let myself feel like a spendthrifty dumb-dumb. Anyway, the fam-damn-ily will be wanting upgrades this year, or next year, or a couple years from now. The fam-damn-ily isn't that interested in hanging their a** over the over-clocking edge (to paraphrase "the Right Stuff"), so these extra sticks may come in handy.

 

[Fatalist]

I have regular non-tracer ballistix 2 x 1 GB PC 6400.
One of the sticks had errors after just a few days.
Now the other stick, by itself since the other one was RMA'd, has flipped out too.

 

[LOUISSSSS]

oh the sticks are def "compatible" but u have a chance of DOA or dying really soon like mine.

if i were you i'd sell it as "brand new in box" so the buyer will take that risk. take the loss on the used stick since it has a good chance of dying too and get a GSkill kit (or other reputable company of your choice)

 

[mikeyikeey]

I hear ya LOUISSSSS, but what makes these sticks unstable? And what makes a pair of sticks from Corsair better?
Someone should make a list of good memory sticks, because I always thought Crucial was a good way to go.
Bonzai, I checked the price on the same sticks and they're only $39.99! You're not kidding, sticks are cheap. Of course.. theres a $35 mail in rebate.
Hopefully the stick will work.. otherwise, I guess I'll be back asking for help in finding the best new purchase.
Quick question though, why are there bad sticks? Is it poor production, a bad company to buy from in general, just certain types of sticks (for example Ballistix) that suck from a company, or what?

 

[BonzaiDuck]

I'll just casually speculate about it . . . guessing . . . .

The Crucial kits were touted for their D9 chips or black-parts as being very over-clockable.

SO?

People tried to squeeze all they could from them. I'm really betting . . . . correct me but "don't hit, don't hit" -- betting that running them at stock latencies, "Auto" voltages etc. wouldn't show anything more than the infant-mortality of other makes and models.

Corsair still has a reputation -- for producing a set of CAS-3 sticks @ DDR=800 before anyone else. they were on the market, people grabbed them up like blood-diamonds, they were then "out of stock." And -- frankly -- I don't think anyone is producing any kits with CAS-3 at that speed. I haven't run across any.

Generally, a good DDR2-800 kit should ran at around 4,4,4,12. The 800Mhz Tracers and Ballistix, the Corsair DHX's that I'm using now (but not exclusive to that model) . . . and possibly some G.SKILLs.

I'll be lucky to get my G.SKILLs back from my hurried and panicky RMA mailing. While some people said you couldn't twist down a DDR20-1000 kit to between 800 and 900 and run with tighter latencies, others said you could. I can't be sure, but I thought G.SKILL was among the earlier companies to hit the market with 4GB 2x2GB kits.

In meantime, after all the threads I posted here about "memory troubles" causing BSODs, I am totally humbled by holes in my over-clocking wisdom and experience. As it now stands, my own troubles weren't OS related; they weren't intrinsically hardware-related; they weren't some . . . . "buggy interaction" between screensaver and PRIME95. I just needed to tweak some termination voltages. That's what it looks like.

So . . . . two thumbs up, Corsair and G.SKILL. My 2GB kit of Tracers is still running strong, though, --- DDR2-800 @ DDR= 875 Mhz and 4,4,4,10. [But as I said somewhere else, just in case, "I have . . . a spare-ahhh-pairrrr!"

UPDATE: Yup. With the 1.2V_HT and CPU_VTT voltages tweaked just enough to get them between 1.3 and 1.35V, we're practically back on top of the target "3.6-Ghz" setting 1:1 with the stock 4GB-kit DDR=800 settings. [I feelingk sooo STEWWW-pid! I'll never live this down -- the spate of panicky posts on all the forums -- never livingk it down! Soch gur-eat sufferingk!!]

 

[mikeyikeey]

The Crucial kits were touted for their D9 chips or black-parts as being very over-clockable.

You're totally right, the D9 chips in my case.

While some people said you couldn't twist down a DDR20-1000 kit to between 800 and 900 and run with tighter latencies, others said you could.

Does this mean running the memory at slower speeds allows you to run them at tighter latencies? What does this do for gaming performance? My sticks are at 1066 and 5-5-5-15 w/ auto voltage. If I lowered it to 800, could I bump up my timings to 4-4-4-12? And would I need extra cooling?

I just needed to tweak some termination voltages.

What are these? What does changing them do?

With the 1.2V_HT and CPU_VTT voltages tweaked just enough to get them between 1.3 and 1.35V, we're practically back on top of the target "3.6-Ghz" setting 1:1 with the stock 4GB-kit DDR=800 settings.

That wasn't even english for me!
I think you're saying adjusting voltages for your memory got your processor to 3.6Ghz, with the ratio setting 1:1 (which is supposed to be good, right?) with your 4gigs of 800 (possibly 1000 lowered to 800) at stock? Did I translate that correctly?

 

[BonzaiDuck]

Sure, Mikey. You should read Greysky's Over-Clocking sticky on "CPUs and Over-Clocking" here at Anandtech.

The main issue about tuning and over-clocking, per memory especially is "bandwidth." If you have the Everest Ultimate program, or you download the trial version, you'll find a memory benchmark tool built into it. These are, of course, "synthetic" benchmarks, and some people don't put a lot of stock in them, but I think the numbers they produce are probably good for comparison purposes.

Since you're going to be limited (possibly) by other hardware like the mobo and the processor when you over-clock, there are a range of settings which may yield the same or similar bandwidth.

That is, at higher speed, the memory will require either more voltage, higher and looser timings or both. At lower speed, you are more likely to find tighter timings that work, but you may need to push the voltage a little to get them.

Tighter timings mean fewer clock-cycles to complete a data operation in memory. So even if DDR speed in Mhz is lower, fewer clock cycles per data operation may mean "faster."

These other two voltages I mentioned may partially be specific to nVidia chipsets. The 1.2V_HT voltage controls the voltage to the MCP channel -- I think this is a data-channel to the PCI-E bus, or something similar to the Hyper-Transport of the AMD-based systems (thus, "HT"). The CPU_VTT is the termination voltage for the CPU's FSB connection. Tweaking either of these slightly may help over-clocking, and may be necessary to get to higher FSB and CPU speeds.

You CAN pick faster spec'd memory and run it at below-spec speeds, and if it's possible to tighten down the latencies below the spec at the rated or spec'd DDR speed in Mhz, it might be helpful if you need to find a 1:1 CPU:RAM setting -- or even a 3:4 setting -- so that you can run the CPU and FSB as fast as possible and stable, and you're not pushing the memory beyond its limits (as you would by taking DDR2-800 memory and running them up to DDR= 875 or 900.)

Right now, I'm testing these Corsair DDR2-800 DHX modules (4GB or 2x2GB) at DD=810. They have nice, reliable and tight timings at their spec. I may even be able to tighten them further, but I don't want to raise the memory voltage. The set of G.SKILLs being returned to me in the mail soon are DDR2-1000s, but there are mixed reviews about running them in the 800 to 900 range with much tighter timings. People say they "don't want to work" that way, so with stock timings of 5,5,5,15, they may have been able to tighten them only to 5,4,4,12.

The way my stress-testing is going now, I may settle for my E8400 processor running at just above 3.6 Ghz if I don't have to raise the voltage or loosen the timings on the Corsairs to push them beyond DDR=810. Even run at spec of DDR=800 Mhz, they allow for 1:1 with the CPU's external frequency of FSB speed of 400, which translates to an system FSB speed of 1600 and a CPU speed of 9 x 400 = 3.6 Ghz.

IMHO, the trick for buying good memory is to find a kit at a lower spec like DDR2-800 which can be OC'd to -- say 875 without shortening their life, while keeping a fairly tight combination of latency timings. Or, you can buy faster memory (with looser timings) so that you can either run them at a different ratio than 1:1 (like 3:4, 4:5, etc.) with the memory running close to or at its rated speed, or you can run them at lower than spec and capture similar bandwidth if you can get tighter timings.

Read Graysky's thread stickied on CPUS and OVer-Clocking.

 

[mikeyikeey]

Hey Bonzai, I checked out that article again from head to toe, and surprisingly I understood a lot more than I used to. I'm all sorts of excited for overclocking my PC.

Theres a catch though.. as there always is. I can't move forward with only 1gig of ram! The replacement stick came in the mail today, and within 30mins it already had some ridiculous amount of errors when tested with memtest.
Didn't take your advice on this one LOUIS, sorry.

So now I have a few questions..
1. Should I RMA both sticks? Even though I have one perfectly fine one? And then have a non-functioning computer for the time being..

2. Can anyone recommend some descent memory?! Forgive me though LOUIS, I don't really know about G.Skill.. never heard of them, and therefore I'm a little skeptical.

3. If I do send in the dead stick, or even both sticks.. what are my chances of getting a working one back from Crucial?

Where do I go from here guys? Summers coming to an end and my gaming has been cut down dramatically, hahaha.

 

[Yellowbeard]

Originally posted by: LOUISSSSS
i dont think theres anything wrong with sending one dimm back, i've done that. at least u get one guaranteed working (that you've tested yourself) DIMM in your PC while u wait. once u get that. i suggest selling the ballistix since it'll be wrapped brand new. theres a high change it'll be DOA. 6 of mine were DOA. gave up the ballistix BS and sold it and got G Skill and its 2 for 2 stable

Pretty much every manufacturer sells memory modules in matched pairs for dual channel operation. If you have the option, I would ALWAYS send in the pair so that you get a matched and tested pair back. Since we are noticing 2 different revisions of memory mentioned in this thread, it would not be a good thing to get back a single module of a different revision. In this specific case, the OP has spare RAM to use and shipping 1 module costs no more than shipping 2.

 

[Yellowbeard]

Also, for 4GB on 32 bit OS', AN806 has some good info:

http://www.corsairmemory.com/appnotes/default.aspx

4GB on a 32 bit OS runs just fine, assuming the hardware likes it.