ASUS P5N-E SLI 650i Thread

[TriBeCa]

Did some fiddling today and am encountering some really weird behavior from the memory controller. At 3.32 GHz 1:1 ratio (415MHz bus) I get memory read speads around 9000-10000 and latency around 50-54ms (depending on whether I'm at 1T or 2T, I tested both). However, at 3.40 GHz and 3.44 GHz (1:1 ratio, 425 and 430 bus) the read spead tanks to just over 8000 and the latency is well over 70ms.

What gives? Anyone encountered this before? I PCMark as well at 3.32GHz as I do 3.44GHz, because the memory latency and read/write speeds take a brutal hit. This is even if I keep almost ALL of the memory subtimings constant (not on auto) as well (tRC and tRD and a couple others). I've tested this at 4-4-4-7 and 4-4-4-12 at both 1T and 2T. Heck I event get better performance from the RAM at 4-4-4-12-2T 830MHz than I do at 5-4-4-7-2T 1063MHz.

Originally Posted by Ghostkilla

What voltages are you guys running or should I ask what would you recommend running for a 3.2Ghz OC on a E6400 Conroe? I try to bump to 1.45v and it will boot into windows but it crashes within seconds of using prime95. Also I might add when I set it @ 1.45v in bios cpu-z reports it as 1.40v. Any thoughts or advice would be greatly appreciated.

I've found the e6400 on this board gets really really power hungry by the time you hit 3.2GHz and higher. The first thing will be to make sure you're pushing at least 1.56 vNB. If you are and you're still having trouble you may need to go as high 1.5vcore, although I doubt. Also make sure your vdimm is NO HIGHER than maximum spec for your RAM. There's a power management issue on this board and if you push too much voltage all over the place, some components won't get enough power.

Originally Posted by OCfrostmage

here is what i got at the moment.
Motherboard:
CPU Type DualCore Intel Core 2 E8400, 3600 MHz (9 x 400)
Motherboard Name Asus P5N-E SLI (2 PCI, 1 PCI-E x1, 2 PCI-E x16, 4 DDR2 DIMM, Audio, Gigabit LAN, IEEE-1394)
Motherboard Chipset nVIDIA nForce 650i SLI
System Memory 2048 MB (DDR2-800 DDR2 SDRAM)
DIMM1: A-Data DQVE1A16 1 GB DDR2-800 DDR2 SDRAM (5-5-5-18 @ 400 MHz) (4-4-4-12 @ 266 MHz) (3-3-3-9 @ 200 MHz)
DIMM2: A-Data DQVE1A16 1 GB DDR2-800 DDR2 SDRAM (5-5-5-18 @ 400 MHz) (4-4-4-12 @ 266 MHz) (3-3-3-9 @ 200 MHz)
BIOS Type Award (12/26/07)
Communication Port Communications Port (COM1)
Communication Port Printer Port (LPT1)

Display:
Video Adapter NVIDIA GeForce 8600 GT (512 MB)


So I have set unlinked mode raised my FSB to 1600mhz which gives me the 3.6ghz over clock.. 1750 works great at 3.9 but im worried I have my cpu voltage on auto and it scales on up to 1.424... is it dangerous to have this set on auto? or is this voltage normal.. my core temps are running about 45-49 Celsius idling while i type this but the main cpu temp in everest is showing 36 at idle.


Any help or comments on my setup would be great..I am also running the stock intel fan but have nice airflow in this system and seems cool...

I use some highend 3d modeling/rendering programs like maya/3dsmax/zbrush and I want to max my render time without frying my processor

What would be a good everyday setting for me?

I would NOT leave your vcore on auto. This board tends to give a lot of juice, and even though your temps are low the penryn processors are reported to die FAST if they're overvolted. You can find discussions of this issue in the Intel CPU forum here. I don't know offhand what voltage range is reasonable, but definately go manual and use the minimum vcore possible to remain stable.

Originally Posted by bandook916

I have a quick question. I have a p5ne-sli paired with a Pentium D 915.

I ordered a E2180 couple days back and a E6600...How far can I take these 2 CPU's with the P5NE-SLI? I'm hoping for well over 3.0. Any ideads/suggestions?

You should have no trouble getting over 3GHz with e6600 at least, and probably the e2180 as well, although I'm less familiar with them. As for ideas/suggestions - check out the OCing guide in my sig

[P1MP1NJ]

Originally Posted by Svven

K shot, nice to know.
Will the Zalman CNPS9700 NT CPU Cooler fit on the mb?
and what mb will be ok to overclock to 3.2GHz and higher?

i have the cpns9500 and i have a thermaltake northbridge cooler and they touch and it barely clears my idle temps are low 30's with my OC although really this board is terrible for overclocking quads even though I got 3.0ghz im going to get a P35 chipset probably because I want to hit 3.6 on air

[mcogan10]

is it safe to run over 1.5v through the northbridge without another cooling solution?

[Ravin]

Originally Posted by P1MP1NJ

i have the cpns9500 and i have a thermaltake northbridge cooler and they touch and it barely clears my idle temps are low 30's with my OC although really this board is terrible for overclocking quads even though I got 3.0ghz im going to get a P35 chipset probably because I want to hit 3.6 on air

Lol...3.0GHz was hard to get on the P5NE, and 3.6GHz as simple as 400*9 and 1.4Vcore on the Maximus. I may even be able to trim some Vcore out....we'll see.

[Betrivent]

And you're posting this in the P5N-E SLI thread because?

[Ravin]

Originally Posted by Betrivent

And you're posting this in the P5N-E SLI thread because?

Because I was one of 3 Q6600s to reach 3.0GHz stable on the P5NE-SLI. Because I've made a lot of friends in this thread and helped a lot of people, and gotten help myself. Because a lot of Quad owners with P5NEs may want to see how their CPU may do in another board.

Don't be beligerent Betrivent. Ill K.O. you.

[TriBeCa]

Ravin - take a look at my comment about the memory controller above, I'd love your input. I'm just baffled as to why I get MUCH better memory benchmarks at 830MHz than at any of the higher speeds I've tested.

Originally Posted by mcogan10

is it safe to run over 1.5v through the northbridge without another cooling solution?

did you reseat the HS with AS5 or some other decent TIM? If you did and you have at least some degree of airflow (from a CPU or side-panel intake fan or something) on the NB, then you're fine.

[OCfrostmage]

thx for the quick reply TriBeCa!

OK I fixed my vcore at 1.4 for now
gonna lower it some more...

For anyone experimenting on the e8400 im reading elsewhere that the vcore values reported in everest are 10 degrees to high.

Im loving this mobo and processor thanks for the help!

[Ravin]

Originally Posted by TriBeCa

Ravin - take a look at my comment about the memory controller above, I'd love your input. I'm just baffled as to why I get MUCH better memory benchmarks at 830MHz than at any of the higher speeds I've tested.

From what I'v read it sounds like MCH strap latencies and not your RAM responsible for your decreased performance at increased DDR MHz. Earlier P965 boards were particularly prone to this phenomenon- it took 3 revisions and 10 BIOS updates, after the 975x release for ASUS and GIGABYTE to get a hold of the problem on the P965. (why I held on to my P945/DDR2-533 for so long). The 650i chipset was supposed to be roughly equivilent to the P965 chipset, so that's my guess.

I've also noticed this phenomenon on my Maximus- I get equal bandwidth and better latencies running DDR-800 on slightly looser timings on the Maximus than I did when I was running DDR-1000 on slightly tighter timings on the P5NE. I'm not too sure yet how this will fine tune, but it looks like I'll probably settle in at 400x9=3.6GHz with DDR-800 on wicked tight timings. Any thoughts on trying to run 1T? Was not stable on the P5NE....

[TriBeCa]

I'm taking a second pass at getting 1T stable now...which is why I encountered the weird MCH behavior (I had assumed it was the MCH and not the RAM, as it would make no sense if it was the RAM itself). I had 1T stable for 6 months or so on my first P5NE (well, actually my second, but the first one died on the first day), and when I killed it with a bad BIOS flash the replacement board wouldn't go stable on 1T.

All I did on my first board was settle on a CPU OC I was happy with, and then go to 1T and rerun orthos. And it worked, so I kept it Orthos seems to hit errors at 1T on this board though (at ~2 hours if I stress CPU and ~5 minutes if I stress RAM).

If you can get it's great though - on this board it dropped my RAM latency by ~4ms, added ~1000 to my read spead and ~300 to my write spead. PCMark05 came up with a score ~600 points higher at 1T vs. 2T (though I might've tightened up some subtimings for that too, I don't remember exactly).