So much for 1:1 fsb:dram ratio being the best

dipstick · Mar 15, 2008, 03:46 PM

I've been playing around with some bios settings and have noticed something very interesting. Being told that 1:1 is the best way to OC ones fsb and ram I was very surprised. Anyways these are some settings and numbers I got from Everest.

430MHz fsb - 430MHz ram(860) - 3.44GHz cpu clock (1:1)
Memory Read- 7498MB/s
Memory Latency - 70.9ns

430MHz fsb - 516MHz ram(1032) - 3.44GHz cpu clock (5:6)
Memory Read - 8986MB/s
Memory Latency - 54.2ns

While I can somewhat understand the higher bandwidth -its still higher than I thought it would be- I was very surprised by the reduced latency. I honestly thought that 1:1 would provide the absolute lowest latency due to working in harmony but I was very wrong. The above may not seem as much but its a noticeable improvement all around. Anyways, I thought I would share my findings for those with the same mindset as the improvement is worthy

PangingJr · Mar 15, 2008, 04:11 PM

swimtech · Mar 15, 2008, 04:12 PM

I absolutely did too - intriguing. Thanks for the heads up!

The real question though is how does it affect application or gaming perfomance though. Is the processor able to incorporate the memory packets out of sync to the advantage of the application at that particular ratio? Noticed PangingJr has got a 5:4 thing going above - even more out of sync...

Lowfat · Mar 15, 2008, 04:28 PM

1:1 was only better during the DDR1 days and all memory ratios weren't upward ratios. With DDR2 things changed as we could finally have ram that was faster than the FSB of the CPU.

PangingJr · Mar 15, 2008, 04:33 PM

try 4:5 if your BIOS and RAM permits, the letency results should be even more improved.

dipstick · Mar 15, 2008, 04:39 PM

Very nice Panging, I've always loved the P35 the most and it never fails to prove it. That's a wicked oc all around.
I've been playing some CoD4 and Crysis to test stability and while I can't say I notice much of an fps increase they do seem quite a bit smoother. Things just seem more fluent and quicker to respond all around.
I should also have mentioned that maybe the strap has something to do with it. I kept it at 400 but 333 seems better and allows for many more memory clock options. Silly me lol
This is the article I read that led me to test this out, and while I understand little from it, it seems to have pointed me in the right direction.

**ChaosMinionX** · Mar 15, 2008, 04:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lowfat

1:1 was only better during the DDR1 days and all memory ratios weren't upward ratios. With DDR2 things changed as we could finally have ram that was faster than the FSB of the CPU.

True story, and for those with a Maximus Formula flashed to a Rampage Formula, it gets even better

I will post some more info shortly.. finishing up benchmarking.

Zelig · Mar 15, 2008, 04:53 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dipstick

This is the article I read that led me to test this out, and while I understand little from it, it seems to have pointed me in the right direction.

Good article there.

On the AMD side, they eliminated the performance hit of not running 1:1 when they moved to the on-die memory controller... not much overclocking happening with their chips at the moment though.

swimtech · Mar 15, 2008, 05:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dipstick

This is the article I read that led me to test this out

That was exactly what I needed to read. I missed it back in January...

Judas · Mar 15, 2008, 05:11 PM

I'm likely to start putting alot of this ocing into more practice soon as my reaper ocz memory arrives.

Neshi · Mar 15, 2008, 06:56 PM

A little free time is all I need before I push my cpu to a 3.6ghz

But as this thread is about memory, I just want to put in a little question.
what is better, pushing latencies as low as possible on, lets say 800mhz sticks, or getting as high Mhz as possible without loosening the latencies too much?

and what about the "secondary" latencies? How do you know how low they can go or is it so negligible (only important for synthetic benchmarks) that it is best left on "auto" and you just mess with the five normal ones. (like the 4-4-4-12-2T)

**ChaosMinionX** · Mar 15, 2008, 08:06 PM

@ Pangingjr

You could probably get more performance out of your RAM by lowering the FSB and tuning the TRD more.

PangingJr · Mar 16, 2008, 12:26 AM

my P35-DS4 is kinda old now, i have been very hard to it for many things and for a long time already, and this board's chipset is not optimized enough for me for my overclocking anymore. i will get a fresh motherboard soon.
but i will not give away this board just yet, it's a good board.
anyways, i will try to do better on a new board next time.

**ChaosMinionX** · Mar 16, 2008, 02:26 AM

Get a maximus formula, and flash it to a rampage formula....you will like what you see.

kris23 · Mar 16, 2008, 02:34 AM

should i flash mine?