Performance Enhance option Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3x mobos

[UTFan81]

According to X-bit Labs review of the Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L the Performance Enhance option in the bios should actually be set to standard for best memory performance. I find this very strange but here is what they said...

"There is a parameter called Performance Enhance in the MB Intelligent Tweaker section. By default it is set to Turbo that turned out to be very important for the overall system performance, because it can help affect Performance Level setting. The lower is Performance Level, the higher is the actual mainboard performance, but we couldn?t determine the actual value for it. If Performance Enhance is set to Turbo or Extreme, Performance Level equals 8 at 490MHz FSB ? it is a good setting. If you set Performance Enhance to Standard, Performance Level increases to 12. The screenshots below allow you to estimate the actual performance difference in these two cases provided all other settings are identical. The first one stands for Performance Enhance set to Standard and Performance Level of 12, while the second one ? for Performance Enhance set to Turbo and Performance Level of 8 respectively."

They have a chart with benchmarks in the full article.
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articl...lay/ga-p35-ds3l_7.html

Is anyone able to back this up or know what the deal is? The latency looks better with it set to Turbo but overall memory performance is far worse.

 

[zorrt]

It crashes my comp on anything aside standard...

 

[UTFan81]

I think that has to do with it requiring more voltage. I can run standard with my Ram at 2.0 but at the same speed/timings Turbo needs 2.1 Anyway, I thought more people would be interesting in finding out about this because it makes no sense to run the default Turbo (which you would think is faster) if standard is better speed overall. I've been running mine on standard for a couple days and my system does seem a bit smoother especially in games.

 

[toadeater]

Interesting info.

 

[hclarkjr]

mine is on turbo at 1.9 vdimm

 

[Conroy9]

I had a lot of trouble understanding that english, but the way I understood it, they were saying that std/turbo/extreme correspond to some "performance level" of 12/8/8 respectively.
You also want this "performance level" to go DOWN in order for overall system performance to increase.

So I think they are actually saying that the turbo is faster than standard.. their chart seems to show that as well.

I'm still wary of using anything but standard, because I like to have complete control of everything that's going on instead of letting the motherboard do some internal voodoo without letting me know what it's doing.

 

[Cheex]

Originally posted by: Conroy9

I'm still wary of using anything but standard, because I like to have complete control of everything that's going on instead of letting the motherboard do some internal voodoo without letting me know what it's doing.

Originally posted by: toadeater
Interesting info.

 

[RussianSensation]

Originally posted by: UTFan81
According to X-bit Labs review of the Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L the Performance Enhance option in the bios should actually be set to standard for best memory performance. I find this very strange but here is what they said...

That's not what I am reading.

The lower the performance enhance (level) value the faster the performance. Since Standard gives you value of 12 and Turbo/Enhance gives you 8, according to Xbitlabs, you lose a lot of performance if you set it to Standard.

 

[UTFan81]

Originally posted by: RussianSensation

Originally posted by: UTFan81
According to X-bit Labs review of the Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L the Performance Enhance option in the bios should actually be set to standard for best memory performance. I find this very strange but here is what they said...

That's not what I am reading.

The lower the performance enhance (level) value the faster the performance. Since Standard gives you value of 12 and Turbo/Enhance gives you 8, according to Xbitlabs, you lose a lot of performance if you set it to Standard.

exactly and why it makes no sense really. the system does seem faster with it on standard but I haven't done any benchmarks yet. I'm not much of a benchmark kinda person.

 

[myocardia]

My GA-P35C-DS3R wouldn't even post (or maybe just was extremely unstable, can't remember now) using the standard setting. Although, that was when I was using 2x1 GB of Crucial Ballistix PC8000. I haven't tried the standard setting with my new 2x2 GB, lower vdimm sticks yet.

 

[RussianSensation]

Originally posted by: UTFan81

Originally posted by: RussianSensation

Originally posted by: UTFan81
According to X-bit Labs review of the Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L the Performance Enhance option in the bios should actually be set to standard for best memory performance. I find this very strange but here is what they said...

That's not what I am reading.

The lower the performance enhance (level) value the faster the performance. Since Standard gives you value of 12 and Turbo/Enhance gives you 8, according to Xbitlabs, you lose a lot of performance if you set it to Standard.

exactly and why it makes no sense really. the system does seem faster with it on standard but I haven't done any benchmarks yet. I'm not much of a benchmark kinda person.

No, it makes sense. Please reread what I just wrote. Xbitlabs explains that performance falls significantly when you use the Standard setting and that is what I read as well. But what you are saying is the opposite which is incorrect.

You are confusing the wording in their meaning of "The lower the performance enhance level..." (This doesn't mean that Standard<Enhance<Turbo, and therefore you should use Standard). It means that Standard 12 > Ehnance x > Turbo 8 and therefore you should use the lowest one which is Turbo.

 

[UTFan81]

Originally posted by: RussianSensation

Originally posted by: UTFan81

Originally posted by: RussianSensation

Originally posted by: UTFan81
According to X-bit Labs review of the Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L the Performance Enhance option in the bios should actually be set to standard for best memory performance. I find this very strange but here is what they said...

That's not what I am reading.

The lower the performance enhance (level) value the faster the performance. Since Standard gives you value of 12 and Turbo/Enhance gives you 8, according to Xbitlabs, you lose a lot of performance if you set it to Standard.

exactly and why it makes no sense really. the system does seem faster with it on standard but I haven't done any benchmarks yet. I'm not much of a benchmark kinda person.

No, it makes sense. Please reread what I just wrote. Xbitlabs explains that performance falls significantly when you use the Standard setting and that is what I read as well. But what you are saying is the opposite which is incorrect.

You are confusing the wording in their meaning of "The lower the performance enhance level..." (This doesn't mean that Standard<Enhance<Turbo, and therefore you should use Standard). It means that Standard 12 > Ehnance x > Turbo 8 and therefore you should use the lowest one which is Turbo.

nevermind I think you are right after all. Turbo is better. Very confusing wording in this article though.

 

[tigersty1e]

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articl...lay/ga-p35-ds3l_7.html

If Performance Enhance is set to Turbo or Extreme, Performance Level equals 8 at 490MHz FSB ? it is a good setting. If you set Performance Enhance to Standard, Performance Level increases to 12.


According to them, Standard gives them the faster performance.

I have mine set to Turbo... because it was here on default anyway and I'm stable now and it sounds faster than standard....

 

[LOUISSSSS]

wait so ur systems are more stable using TURBO? can someone explain this in easier to understand terms pls

 

[BlueAcolyte]

Originally posted by: tigersty1e
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articl...lay/ga-p35-ds3l_7.html

If Performance Enhance is set to Turbo or Extreme, Performance Level equals 8 at 490MHz FSB ? it is a good setting. If you set Performance Enhance to Standard, Performance Level increases to 12.


According to them, Standard gives them the faster performance.

I have mine set to Turbo... because it was here on default anyway and I'm stable now and it sounds faster than standard....

I think that lower is better... So 8 is better than 12. Confusing stuff, huh.

 

[Idontcare]

I played around a lot with this feature when I was setting up my DS3L/Q6600's a few months ago.

What I gathered from it is that BOTH the Standard and the Turbo settings work on an increasing scale of "better" but they impact different parameters.

If you set it to standard then increasing the numbers "increases the stability" by decreasing the aggresiveness of some internal memory timing. (edit: as such, in standard setting decreasing the number from 12 to 8 increases performance as it decreases stability)

However if you set it to turbo then increasing the numbers "increase the performance" by increasing the aggressiveness of the same internal memory timing. (edit: as such, in turbo setting decreasing the number from 12 to 8 decreases performance as it increases stability)

It took me a while (days) of playing with it to realize the Gigabyte engineers were changing the very meaning of the scale when you switch that setting from standard to turbo.

I can only imagine they had many internal meetings and debates over which method would generate the most confusion, and they downselected to the current technique thinking it was the best approach for the user.

I leave it on standard and walk away from the BIOS. Total PITA.

 

[Idontcare]

double post? Wierd.

 

[tigersty1e]

What performance number are they even talking about?

I already have the FSB, multiplier, and voltage set, so the CPU is good to go.

All my motherboard voltages are set.

My ram volage, frequency, and timings are manually set.


What other area is there to even tweak? I can't see how some other number will give me an increase in performance.

 

[SystemPlue]

I am no expert.... but i have it on set on "Standard" .... everything is set manually except for Advanced Ram Timing (i dont know what to change in this section so i left it on Auto)

 

[tigersty1e]

I just noticed this, but the chart doesn't match what they are saying...

" The screenshots below allow you to estimate the actual performance difference in these two cases provided all other settings are identical. The first one stands for Performance Enhance set to Standard and Performance Level of 12, while the second one ? for Performance Enhance set to Turbo and Performance Level of 8 respectively."


But in the screenshot, the second chart is faster than the first. For read, write, and copy, higher is better, right? And for latency, lower is better?


I can't believe they fudged this. If they fudged this, they could've fudged the whole experiment.

 

[Conroy9]

I *think* it's consistent

They are saying that 8 is supposed to be faster than 12, so the second chart should be faster

 

[rforum]

It is confusing. All I know is that I could not get my DS3L FSB to 400 while in 'Turbo' mode even with increased memory and core voltages. Using the 'Standard' setting allowed me to do so - and backed off the voltages to run cooler.

 

[cpemma]

According to the first post in this THG thread,

The "Performance Enhance" setting adjusts tRD on the DS3L as follows:
Standard__tRD=11
Turbo_____tRD=6
Extreme___I have never been able to POST at this setting, so I don't know

With my system, set 'Standard', I found my 'Static tRead Value' which he equates to tRD was already auto-set at 8, so looks like YMMV with the RAM used, etc. But I do agree with him it's better to leave on 'Standard' and tweak the individual memory values. I'm still stable at 7 and will try 6, but going from 'Standard' to 'Turbo' has crashed in the past.

Note the links to the Anandtech article on the importance of tRD.

As an aside, I've just looked at my memory settings in Memset. The only '7' is against what Memset terms 'Performance Level', so I'm guessing X-Bit are quoting the Memset 'Performance Level' numbers, it's tRD, and lower is better.

 

[Syzygies]

Yes, this is tRD. I found RULE #1 in working with this board was to do everything manually, e.g. set tRD manually, rather than letting the board make dumb guesses for me that won't necessarily work.

At 3.2 Ghz on a G0 Q6600, I've collected many timings and run linear regressions on them. At slower FSB speeds tRD is less important than CAS itself, but at a FSB of 400, they're equally significant, for a particular memory-intensive scientific benchmark which is sensitive to these settings.

But, back to this thread, why would anyone have a board make guesses about a setting one doesn't understand? Learn what it does and control it manually!!! Drive stick, not automatic.

 

[gizbug]

Any conclusion on what this setting should be set at?