i7 O/C and 6 Memory Sticks...

[Arthalen]

Am I right in assuming that if I fully populate a X58 board with 6 sticks for 12GB of ram, I'm going to limit my OC'ing results on a 950?

I'm looking at starting with a 950/P6X58D-E with 6GB of triple channel memory, but will be looking to got 12GB in the future.

From my (limited) understanding of i7 overclocking, I'd be looking at a 174mhz 'FSB' (or whatever its called these days) at a 23x multiplier to hit 4Ghz. Witha 1:5 Memory multiplier, thats a memory speed of 1740mhz DDR.

Am I realistically going to hit this with 6 sticks, or would I be better off going with a 1:4 memory multiplier (1392mhz DDR) and thus the cheaper 1600mhz RAM?

 

[Arthalen]

Thanks for the responses guys. Reassuring to know I can do this.

 

[Arthalen]

For memory and old-style Northbridge testing, I couldn't recommend using Prime95's Blend mode any higher.

All too often its easy to get a Small FFT (Purely core testing) or Large FFT (Core & L2 testing) loop of testing done and passed over 8 hours, to then see the blend test fail after 10 minutes or so due to lack of stability in accessing memory at any given overclock. On the 775 platform, a mixture of bootstrap, northbridge clock/divider, voltage and a pinch of magic pixie dust was required to get a Blend test passed and working.

So, I think I'm right in thinking that the additional stress on the built in CPU memory controller is going cause a few issues with overclocking it seems. I think having a higher multiplier CPU is the trick here, requiring less BCLK to get the overclock required. And as w3bbo mentioned, QPI voltage will need tweaking.

But, as you've shown Jon, it is possible And that's what I think is going to swing me in a i7 vs X6 debate.

Hmm, roll on the end of the month when I can purchase my hardware