Corsair XMS

[gdeman]

Corsair XMS is crashing my system at Cas 2 setting, it crashes it in 3dmark2001se and in sandra bandwidth benchmark, i have tried 5,2,2,2 ; 6,3,3,2 ; 7,3,3,2 and so far all have crashed my system i have not upped the Dram Voltage from default, is this my problem? right now my rig as been rock stable at 166FSB and is memory is at 100%. anyone have any clues? i am currently at 7,3,3,3 timings and it seems stable enough now to run the benches, the only problem i had is i crashed enough to get a corrupted windows system32 file and im supposed to attempt to repair it but other than to a reformat and clean install i dont know how. thanks
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[Jay T]

Yes, you should up your ram voltage to 2.77. This is what Corsair reccommend & this mobo tends to undervolt the ram antway if the status monitor is to be believed.

[BlueMhz]

Yep, I'd definitely try upping the RAM voltage to 2.77.

Even when running my Corsair modules at stock speed, I had to bump them up to 2.77 to get stability.

[gdeman]

ok i think i was able to go as far as 7,3,3,2.
but if i set my cpu interface and memory above optimal i get unstable. i have noticed that upping my voltage to 2.77 really means my voltage is 2.704, and setting my voltage to 2.90 actually sets it to 2.83. something is making my system very unstable at aggressive timings, i start getting alot of system file corruptions messing with it... but im kinda confused why the last memory stick i had would time at 5,2,2,2 and not give me any problems.

[SteveI]

Originally posted by gdeman
ok i think i was able to go as far as 7,3,3,2.
but if i set my cpu interface and memory above optimal i get unstable. i have noticed that upping my voltage to 2.77 really means my voltage is 2.704, and setting my voltage to 2.90 actually sets it to 2.83. something is making my system very unstable at aggressive timings, i start getting alot of system file corruptions messing with it... but im kinda confused why the last memory stick i had would time at 5,2,2,2 and not give me any problems.

I know the feeling. My Kingston Valueram PC2700 was very happy running 200fsb @2.75v (2t w/ all else max timings.) I just started testing my XMS3200 on the same board.... it can't do it (not even 180mhz & stock timings). I have to turn off COMMAND DECODE to get it working....

There's a 35% price premium, and it can't even get anywhere near the cheap RAM.

The aggressive timings is what is probably getting to you. Rather than corrupting your windows install, try memtest in aoa files... it runs off a bootable floppy, so you don't fubar your OS trying to test. If you suspect memory problems, don't boot into windows, try to get stability with memtest first.

A lot of people have complained about compatibility with new mobos.. I tend to think it is actually marginal memory placed into mobos that can run very agressively.

[AdvoCake]

Well, I picked up 2x256mb of corsair xms3200 when i bought my 8rda+. It's currently running sync @ 200mhz fsb. Voltages are default, according to MBM:
VDD: 1.58
VCore: 1.63
VDIMM: 2.62

So, presumably I just got lucky, or you got UNlucky.