2 questions im not sure about

Geekazoid · 17 Jul 2009 at 02:28

1) what should the uncore frequency be????? as i take it the uncore should be twice the speed of ur ram speed??? e.g. if my ram is 1600mhz my uncore should be set to 3.2ghz (i.e 1600 x 2 = 3200mhz)

2) also what is Command Rate (CMD) i have 3 options (1,2,3) it is currently at 2 what should it be for my RAM??? can i set it to 1???

thankyou

boldenc · 17 Jul 2009 at 02:43

1- Uncore should be 2x the memory multi, for example, if you use multi 8x, then uncore should be set to 16x. Optimal setting when using 8x multi is to use 16x uncore but some people use higher uncore to boost the L3 speed, it is ok to use faster uncore 16x+ if you can keep stability but you can't set the uncore lower than 16x

2- CMD is part of memory timmings, lower is better. Most i7 memory use 1T, motherboard default to 2T to enhance stability with some ram.

Meridian · 17 Jul 2009 at 06:36

Note that for most circumstances there is a practical limit of 3500 for uncore. If you go over that you will almost certainly run into trouble. I've heard that running very fast (14000 or better) RAM might enable you to go a bit higher, but I've not tested this.

M

JonJ678 · 17 Jul 2009 at 07:41

Oh no. I was starting to think I was getting somewhere with x58. Uncore is one of the frequencies on the i7 chip itself?

So memory has to be at least x6 your blck, and uncore at least twice memory, but can't go over 3500mhz. Maximum of 290 blck probably doesn't matter, but ddr3 is available in faster speeds than 1750mhz.

Does uncore frequency therefore mark a maximum to how fast you can run your memory, if the ram itself isn't limiting before this?

Geekazoid · 17 Jul 2009 at 14:39

So memory has to be at least x6 your blck, and uncore at least twice memory, but can't go over 3500mhz. Maximum of 290 blck probably doesn't matter, but ddr3 is available in faster speeds than 1750mhz.

Does uncore frequency therefore mark a maximum to how fast you can run your memory, if the ram itself isn't limiting before this?

yup i think your right mate cos you be reaching the limit of the memory controller... but i need clarification on this...

JonJ678 · 17 Jul 2009 at 14:51

Is the uncore frequency the frequency of the memory controller then?

Meridian · 18 Jul 2009 at 09:18

JonJ678 said:
Oh no. I was starting to think I was getting somewhere with x58. Uncore is one of the frequencies on the i7 chip itself?

So memory has to be at least x6 your blck, and uncore at least twice memory, but can't go over 3500mhz. Maximum of 290 blck probably doesn't matter, but ddr3 is available in faster speeds than 1750mhz.

Does uncore frequency therefore mark a maximum to how fast you can run your memory, if the ram itself isn't limiting before this?

Uncore is, yes, the memory controller clock. Once you start hitting high bclck speeds then the multipliers for uncore and QPI become dictated by their maximum speeds: about 3500 and 7500 respectively. The very first things I usually do when overclocking i7 rigs are find the limits to the RAM (which depends on what you have), uncore and QPI (which seem dictated by the X58 chipset). As I said, eventually much of your choice will be taken away from you, but in the meantime keep as close as you can to those maxima without exceeding them, altering the multipliers as needed.

Note also that you are unlikely to get a bclck higher than 210, even with (I believe) a water-cooled setup.

But no, uncore and RAM speed are independent, so just aim for the max for both, tweaking multipliers as appropriate. It's difficult to see how uncore could be less than twice RAM speed unless you have astonishingly fast RAM.

M