Starting to learn DDR1...

[MachineLearning]

Hi everyone

I realize that some answers to these questions can be found online, but I think this is the best possible group of people to ask for the most accurate answers.

Starting to tweak DDR1 on 462, 478, 754, and 939 (still waiting on boards to arrive except for Socket A). Got a variety of RAM to play with:

- TCCD

- CH-5

- KVR BH-6 (maybe CH-6, haven't received to test CL3)

- Infineon AT-6 (= Winbond BH-6)

- Hynix BT-D43, DT-D43

- Micron 5B-G

I read that D43 plays very well with NF2, and that 5B-G is a bit of a sleeper IC but with variable quality.

Any general tips for these ICs? Binning criteria, oddities (like no CL3 on BH-x, etc.), experiences with the weirder ones in bold? Reasonable voltages?

- At what point is it worth modding a motherboard for higher vDIMM? (3.0v limit, 3.2v, ...)

- Is it true that s939 CPUs can be damaged by too high of a delta between vDIMM to vCore? If so, what equation should be followed?

- Does dual-rank vs. SR DIMMs matter for performance?

- How important is a Brainpower, Levin, etc. PCB vs JEDEC? (MHz increase on average over JEDEC)

- Is BH-6 always inherently worse than BH-5?

- Temperature more important than voltage for DDR1 longevity?

I welcome any and all pointers

[ShrimpBrime]

Wish I had the experience with all those makes, but I don't.

Lot of good luck with TCCD myself, some chips capable cl-1.5 up to 220mhz.

BH-5 clocks well, loves vdimm. 280mhz usually no problem cl-2.

But from anything I've tried, a lot depends on that memory controller. You can bin chips for memory OC like you would cpu frequency.

[Bones]

I know BH5 can do CL1.5 at times, my unbinned BH5 OCZ Gold's will do it.

BH5 loves voltage and it's one IC that's voltage-happy as in "Ride the lightning" happy.
Just make provisions for good cooling when volting it up and it will be OK, usually BH5 does great with about 3.6v's or so applied.

TCCD is a voltage hater type of RAM, 2.9v's is all you need under most circumstances to top it out. Of course you can go even higher with voltage but that also starts to invites degredation to the party and degredation itself doesn't mind crashing it.
If you do go higher than 2.9v's, good cooling is a must with TCCD sticks if you want it to have a decent lifespan.

In my view it's suggested to reduce voltage to a safer value once you're done with your runs, such as using the system to do an OS setup for example.
I'd only volt it up for high mhz RAM speed benching runs such as Super PI, reduce it if your RAM speeds won't be that high to do a run such as in WPrime. It can affect the bench but the effect is so negligible it's hardly worth risking a good set of sticks over it.

[Macsbeach98]

I havent had any experience with any of the others I have read that Infineon AT6 are supposed to be good like BH5
There are only 2 as far as I am concerned BH5 and TCCD
All corsair 3500C2 are BH5 and all XL as in 3200XL are TCCD.
10 years ago you could find them easily enough these days they are as rare as rocking horse shit.
BH5 the goto voltage is 3.6v which I run in 939 so I dont know about the chips degrading from too much ram voltage first I have heard about that.
DFI Ultra D the ram voltage goes to 4v sounds like someone had a chip degrade and blamed it on the ram voltage I usually dont go over 3.6 though.
If your BH5 wont do 2-2-2-5 @ 270 Mhz 540 DDR in Ultra D they are not much good one thing letting off the timings wont get you a whole lot further with BH5.
TCCD dont go over 2.9v I usually run them at 2.8v will run them at 2.9 if trying to push them hard but no more they are too hard to replace and they will degrade.
With TCCD you should be able to get to 300 Mhz 2.5-3-3-7 on a Ultra D fairly easily if not they have been burnt.
The DDR frequency record was done with TCCD at 3.6v of course it didnt do the ram much good.
Actually Ozz had a pair of Team extreme ram that he bought from Websmile one stick done 400Mhz at high voltage but it only done it a couple of times then was dead I have the other stick here it did 380Mhz

Now we come to boards
939 DFI Ultra D or Expert are the boards forget the rest unless you want to run SLI Asus A8N32SLI Deluxe is the other goto.
478 Asus P4C800E-Deluxe I875, Asus P4P800-SE 865PE, Abit IC7maxx3 I875, Abit IS7 965PE are the only boards I would look at.
462 NF7S Rev.2 is the board there is DFI Ultra B another rocking horse shit board (cant find) but they do high bus but die easily.
With NF7S you will need a OCZ ram booster for BH5 as the voltage only goes to 2.8v you can voltmod and get 3.2v but for 3.6v you need a ram booster.
You are a Discord man ask around someone should sell you a OCZ of Firestix ram booster a valuable thing for 462 and BH5 or AT6

One thing to remember with these boards are that they are close to 20 years old and a lot you buy dont run as good as they should I have had P4C800-E that will run the ram up to 300mhz 1:1 others can only run the ram up to 240Mhz then you have to lower the ram to the 5-4 divider.
NF7S can be the same there can be a big difference between a good board and a bad one.

I started my HWBot career with a NF7S I had 2 SSD's raid 0 and a Gainward Bliss 7800GS which is a 7900GS chip and was taking gold in PCM04 and 05 with all the socket A CPUs and was hooked.

[Mr.Scott]

I'll add.....You can use a small buck converter rather than OCZ booster. I've had mine to 3.8v no problem.
It will still not help the VTT tracking though. Booster doesn't either anyway.
I will take pic of my board (for wiring) if you go this route. It's an easy mod.

[Macsbeach98]

Put that VTT tracking mod in the voltmods I could want to do that again oneday.

[pioneerisloud]

Question for you expert DDR1 clockers then...... What about TCB3? According to the DDR1 RAM list here, that's what I have in my OCZ Platinum PC3200, 2-3-2-5 sticks. I can get those up to 270MHz no problem (2x1GB). I'm not sure the revision, but back in Socket 939's actual hayday, I had 4x1GB of Corsair XMS DDR400 and either set of 2 I tried could do 566 no problem all day rock solid stable at 2.85-2.90v. Wish I still had those particular sticks but oh well.

Neat thread. RAM is waaay too complicated for me. I usually try various standard RAM timings, up to 2.90v, and hope things work out. I find it fascinating how well some of you guys can get their sticks dialed in.

[zila1]

It's an art and these boyz have it down. 

[MachineLearning]

Thank you everyone for your responses

Macsbeach98 , these are the boards I've got coming. Luckily they (except MSI wild card) align with your list of DFI alternatives, since DFI is totally unontainable for a reasonable price.
- AN7 (thanks Scotty )
- IS7-E v1.2
- A8N32-SLI Deluxe
- K8N Neo3-F
I honestly enjoy playing with 2nd/3rd best, things are more interesting when they go wrong. DFI is long-term goal though.

BH-6 I fortunately found a bunch of on eBay in OEM (Infineon) or KVR sticks, TCCD I didn't look nearly as long, but didn't see any. Aside from Infineon AT-6, I found out that Kingston ValueRam P/N KVR333X64C25 often is Winbond BH-6 or maybe AH-6. Link to one example:
www.ebay.com/itm/173790857229?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&mkrid=711-127632-2357-0&ssspo=vAONxfFhQR-&sssrc=2349624&ssuid=pfzluwkstrg&var=&widget_ver=artemis&media=COPY

Very glad that Winbond ICs are so physically obvious.

Mr.Scott , please do show us the mod. Even if it's a while, I'll eventually get to it.

As a side note, what I had read about Micron 5B-G is that it performs similarly to BH-x except it likes to be slightly looser and hits higher speeds. So a bit of a blend between TCCD & BH-5.
Apparently they like slightly higher CAS, 2.5-2-2-5 @ 500MHz+. Anandtech: www.anandtech.com/show/1415/9 ICs are on page 3 for Ballistix.

As pioneerisloud asked, are there any accepted substitutes for TCCD? Maybe another Samsung chip, or Hynix D43?

Oh, and to set the record straight - I'm "on" Discord but vastly prefer being here.
Way more permanence and community. But now I digress

[Bones]

An alternative to BH5 are Hynix B sticks.
I have a set and they do well with voltage, they're able to tolerate higher voltages too but overall they like it a bit lower than BH5 does. 3.3v's for these is right on target but you can go higher as long as you keep them cool - Also these sticks are capable of CL1.5 timings too.
These are the IC's in my 2x 256mb PC4400 OCZ Gold sticks I've had like, forever now.
If I knew back then what I know now, I would have bought several sets of these instead of just the one set I've got.

Trick to Hynix B sticks is just finding a set, much less a good set of them - It's one IC type you don't really see up for grabs anywhere.

[MachineLearning]

Nov 15, 2022 22:39:04 GMT -5 Bones said:

An alternative to BH5 are Hynix B sticks.
I have a set and they do well with voltage, they're able to tolerate higher voltages too but overall they like it a bit lower than BH5 does. 3.3v's for these is right on target but you can go higher as long as you keep them cool - Also these sticks are capable of CL1.5 timings too.
These are the IC's in my 2x 256mb PC4400 OCZ Gold sticks I've had like, forever now.
If I knew back then what I know now, I would have bought several sets of these instead of just the one set I've got.

Trick to Hynix B sticks is just finding a set, much less a good set of them - It's one IC type you don't really see up for grabs anywhere.

Good to know, thanks. Do you have a photo of the IC? Or is it as simple as -B at the end, like Hynix D43?

[Macsbeach98]

My alternative to BH5 would be Corsair XMS3202 Rev 1.5 Winbond 5 UTT they are the same as BH5 but untested I have a pair of those too that go Ok do around 265 @ 2-2-2-5.
Alternative for TCCD would be TCCC there are others best thing is get what you can and test them in a board your A8N32SLI-Deluxe would be Ok for testing TCCD or alternatives doesnt have the voltage for BH5 though.
One thing to remember the ram that are 6 are six nanosecond rated chips anyway you look at it 5 nanosecond chips should run tighter at the same frequencies.

[Bones]

Nov 15, 2022 22:46:46 GMT -5 MachineLearning said:

Nov 15, 2022 22:39:04 GMT -5 Bones said:

An alternative to BH5 are Hynix B sticks.
I have a set and they do well with voltage, they're able to tolerate higher voltages too but overall they like it a bit lower than BH5 does. 3.3v's for these is right on target but you can go higher as long as you keep them cool - Also these sticks are capable of CL1.5 timings too.
These are the IC's in my 2x 256mb PC4400 OCZ Gold sticks I've had like, forever now.
If I knew back then what I know now, I would have bought several sets of these instead of just the one set I've got.

Trick to Hynix B sticks is just finding a set, much less a good set of them - It's one IC type you don't really see up for grabs anywhere.

Good to know, thanks. Do you have a photo of the IC? Or is it as simple as -B at the end, like Hynix D43?

I don't have any pics to show or have ever seen the IC itself.
I'm not stripping the heatspreaders from these since they are the good, heavy copper ones sticks used to come with and since they work as is, I'm not messing that up.

[MachineLearning]

Nov 15, 2022 23:06:32 GMT -5 Macsbeach98 said:

My alternative to BH5 would be Corsair XMS3202 Rev 1.5 Winbond 5 UTT they are the same as BH5 but untested I have a pair of those too that go Ok do around 265 @ 2-2-2-5.
Alternative for TCCD would be TCCC there are others best thing is get what you can and test them in a board your A8N32SLI-Deluxe would be Ok for testing TCCD or alternatives doesnt have the voltage for BH5 though.
One thing to remember the ram that are 6 are six nanosecond rated chips anyway you look at it 5 nanosecond chips should run tighter at the same frequencies.

Understood - what are the primary differences between TCCC & TCCD? Is it basically just a worse revision that clocks lower?

I'll keep an eye out for any XMS v1.5, or any v1.x for that matter.

Is UTT marked as UTT on the chips themselves? Or is it generally rebadged/relabeled by Kingston, Corsair etc.?

[Macsbeach98]

I will have to pull the heatspreaders to have a look probably tomorrow

[MachineLearning]

Nov 16, 2022 2:16:54 GMT -5 Macsbeach98 said:

I will have to pull the heatspreaders to have a look probably tomorrow

You don't have to if it's a hassle, I only wanted to whet my curiosity.


Thanks for bearing with my endless questions everyone.

[Bones]

We LOVE dealing with these kinds of questions because it helps us to remember it for ourselves.
So fire away with them, we'll deal and be happy to if it helps.

[Mr.Scott]

Nov 15, 2022 23:54:09 GMT -5 MachineLearning said:

Nov 15, 2022 23:06:32 GMT -5 Macsbeach98 said:

My alternative to BH5 would be Corsair XMS3202 Rev 1.5 Winbond 5 UTT they are the same as BH5 but untested I have a pair of those too that go Ok do around 265 @ 2-2-2-5.
Alternative for TCCD would be TCCC there are others best thing is get what you can and test them in a board your A8N32SLI-Deluxe would be Ok for testing TCCD or alternatives doesnt have the voltage for BH5 though.
One thing to remember the ram that are 6 are six nanosecond rated chips anyway you look at it 5 nanosecond chips should run tighter at the same frequencies.

Understood - what are the primary differences between TCCC & TCCD? Is it basically just a worse revision that clocks lower?

I'll keep an eye out for any XMS v1.5, or any v1.x for that matter.

Is UTT marked as UTT on the chips themselves? Or is it generally rebadged/relabeled by Kingston, Corsair etc.?

UTT is marked UTT. I have a couple sets of those too.

[Mr.Scott]

Nov 15, 2022 20:08:33 GMT -5 pioneerisloud said:

Question for you expert DDR1 clockers then...... What about TCB3? According to the DDR1 RAM list here, that's what I have in my OCZ Platinum PC3200, 2-3-2-5 sticks. I can get those up to 270MHz no problem (2x1GB). I'm not sure the revision, but back in Socket 939's actual hayday, I had 4x1GB of Corsair XMS DDR400 and either set of 2 I tried could do 566 no problem all day rock solid stable at 2.85-2.90v. Wish I still had those particular sticks but oh well.

Neat thread. RAM is waaay too complicated for me. I usually try various standard RAM timings, up to 2.90v, and hope things work out. I find it fascinating how well some of you guys can get their sticks dialed in.

Your OCZ's are Infineon BE-5's. I have a set. They'll do 2-3-2-5 to 235 and 2.5-3-2-5 to 270. All at 2.85v. They don't like any more voltage than that.

[pioneerisloud]

Nov 16, 2022 9:07:31 GMT -5 Mr.Scott said:

Nov 15, 2022 20:08:33 GMT -5 pioneerisloud said:

Question for you expert DDR1 clockers then...... What about TCB3? According to the DDR1 RAM list here, that's what I have in my OCZ Platinum PC3200, 2-3-2-5 sticks. I can get those up to 270MHz no problem (2x1GB). I'm not sure the revision, but back in Socket 939's actual hayday, I had 4x1GB of Corsair XMS DDR400 and either set of 2 I tried could do 566 no problem all day rock solid stable at 2.85-2.90v. Wish I still had those particular sticks but oh well.

Neat thread. RAM is waaay too complicated for me. I usually try various standard RAM timings, up to 2.90v, and hope things work out. I find it fascinating how well some of you guys can get their sticks dialed in.

Your OCZ's are Infineon BE-5's. I have a set. They'll do 2-3-2-5 to 235 and 2.5-3-2-5 to 270. All at 2.85v. They don't like any more voltage than that.

Really?  o.0  I hope my second set coming in is the same or close.   Good stuff (well good enough).  I was using 3-3-3-8 timings on them, just because I assumed 2.5 CL would be far too tight for those speeds.  Yeah, the OCZ's I was at 2.85v too, I didn't need to bump it up so didn't bother and figured they weren't going to pass about 270 anyway.  I'll have to tinker with tighter timings next time I have them out.

Actually honest question, anybody have any tips on getting 4 sticks to play nicely on 939?  I can do it, but I'm ALWAYS stuck at 2T CR, and honestly I can never seem to get the speeds too terribly high.  My to date BEST runs with 4 sticks was about DDR466 or so, about a decade ago with my above mentioned really freaking awesome XMS sticks.  I have a similar set of 4x1 XMS right now that won't go above about 400-420 or so no matter timings.  It'd be kind of neat to see these OCZ 4x1 set running at 500.

[Mr.Scott]

Nov 16, 2022 12:31:31 GMT -5 pioneerisloud said:

Nov 16, 2022 9:07:31 GMT -5 Mr.Scott said:

Your OCZ's are Infineon BE-5's. I have a set. They'll do 2-3-2-5 to 235 and 2.5-3-2-5 to 270. All at 2.85v. They don't like any more voltage than that.

Really?  o.0  I hope my second set coming in is the same or close.   Good stuff (well good enough).  I was using 3-3-3-8 timings on them, just because I assumed 2.5 CL would be far too tight for those speeds.  Yeah, the OCZ's I was at 2.85v too, I didn't need to bump it up so didn't bother and figured they weren't going to pass about 270 anyway.  I'll have to tinker with tighter timings next time I have them out.

Actually honest question, anybody have any tips on getting 4 sticks to play nicely on 939?  I can do it, but I'm ALWAYS stuck at 2T CR, and honestly I can never seem to get the speeds too terribly high.  My to date BEST runs with 4 sticks was about DDR466 or so, about a decade ago with my above mentioned really freaking awesome XMS sticks.  I have a similar set of 4x1 XMS right now that won't go above about 400-420 or so no matter timings.  It'd be kind of neat to see these OCZ 4x1 set running at 500.

4 sticks on 939 will always default to 2T and 333MHz strap.
Best advice, use 2 sticks.

[pioneerisloud]

Nov 16, 2022 12:44:05 GMT -5 Mr.Scott said:

Nov 16, 2022 12:31:31 GMT -5 pioneerisloud said:

Really?  o.0  I hope my second set coming in is the same or close.   Good stuff (well good enough).  I was using 3-3-3-8 timings on them, just because I assumed 2.5 CL would be far too tight for those speeds.  Yeah, the OCZ's I was at 2.85v too, I didn't need to bump it up so didn't bother and figured they weren't going to pass about 270 anyway.  I'll have to tinker with tighter timings next time I have them out.

Actually honest question, anybody have any tips on getting 4 sticks to play nicely on 939?  I can do it, but I'm ALWAYS stuck at 2T CR, and honestly I can never seem to get the speeds too terribly high.  My to date BEST runs with 4 sticks was about DDR466 or so, about a decade ago with my above mentioned really freaking awesome XMS sticks.  I have a similar set of 4x1 XMS right now that won't go above about 400-420 or so no matter timings.  It'd be kind of neat to see these OCZ 4x1 set running at 500.

4 sticks on 939 will always default to 2T and 333MHz strap.
Best advice, use 2 sticks.

Oh I'm fully aware of that.  I thought there was some trick to getting 1T CR and higher clocks (not the strap, but just higher in general with overclocking).  I've seen some dude while searching this stuff, agent_x007 I think was his name on another forum, he had an FX-60 with 4 sticks of 2GB ECC (same stuff I have) and he was pulling DDR500 speeds and 1T CR with it.

[Mr.Scott]

He is a member here too.
Could be modded bios or just odd hardware. Could be a bunch of reasons.

[pioneerisloud]

Nov 16, 2022 13:12:55 GMT -5 Mr.Scott said:

He is a member here too.
Could be modded bios or just odd hardware. Could be a bunch of reasons.

Ahh, that totally makes sense that he'd be here too!  

You're not wrong, he might have binned some really lucky parts too.  I usually consider myself "happy" if I can score DDR400 speeds with 4 sticks since anything above 333 is an overclock anyway on the IMC (with 4 sticks).  Usually that's not a problem, but setting the bar lower means expectations are easier to reach.  

[ShrimpBrime]

Nov 15, 2022 18:40:14 GMT -5 Macsbeach98 said:

I havent had any experience with any of the others I have read that Infineon AT6 are supposed to be good like BH5
There are only 2 as far as I am concerned BH5 and TCCD
All corsair 3500C2 are BH5 and all XL as in 3200XL are TCCD.
10 years ago you could find them easily enough these days they are as rare as rocking horse shit.
BH5 the goto voltage is 3.6v which I run in 939 so I dont know about the chips degrading from too much ram voltage first I have heard about that.
DFI Ultra D the ram voltage goes to 4v sounds like someone had a chip degrade and blamed it on the ram voltage I usually dont go over 3.6 though.
If your BH5 wont do 2-2-2-5 @ 270 Mhz 540 DDR in Ultra D they are not much good one thing letting off the timings wont get you a whole lot further with BH5.
TCCD dont go over 2.9v I usually run them at 2.8v will run them at 2.9 if trying to push them hard but no more they are too hard to replace and they will degrade.
With TCCD you should be able to get to 300 Mhz 2.5-3-3-7 on a Ultra D fairly easily if not they have been burnt.
The DDR frequency record was done with TCCD at 3.6v of course it didnt do the ram much good.
Actually Ozz had a pair of Team extreme ram that he bought from Websmile one stick done 400Mhz at high voltage but it only done it a couple of times then was dead I have the other stick here it did 380Mhz

Now we come to boards
939 DFI Ultra D or Expert are the boards forget the rest unless you want to run SLI Asus A8N32SLI Deluxe is the other goto.
478 Asus P4C800E-Deluxe I875, Asus P4P800-SE 865PE, Abit IC7maxx3 I875, Abit IS7 965PE are the only boards I would look at.
462 NF7S Rev.2 is the board there is DFI Ultra B another rocking horse shit board (cant find) but they do high bus but die easily.
With NF7S you will need a OCZ ram booster for BH5 as the voltage only goes to 2.8v you can voltmod and get 3.2v but for 3.6v you need a ram booster.
You are a Discord man ask around someone should sell you a OCZ of Firestix ram booster a valuable thing for 462 and BH5 or AT6

One thing to remember with these boards are that they are close to 20 years old and a lot you buy dont run as good as they should I have had P4C800-E that will run the ram up to 300mhz 1:1 others can only run the ram up to 240Mhz then you have to lower the ram to the 5-4 divider.
NF7S can be the same there can be a big difference between a good board and a bad one.

I started my HWBot career with a NF7S I had 2 SSD's raid 0 and a Gainward Bliss 7800GS which is a 7900GS chip and was taking gold in PCM04 and 05 with all the socket A CPUs and was hooked.

My TCCD does not like cas 2.5. S939
X58, a lot of chips seemed to like Cas 3 actually.
Have done 2-0-0-2 on socket A 200mhz.
But 1.5 cas on s939 seems good as long as you get close to 210mhz frequency.

Of course using custom ROMs seems to make a difference also. Some one learning ddr would be mindful of this.

[MachineLearning]

Any ideas what IC these are?

Stripped OCZ Premier 400MHz CAS2.5-3-3-7

[Macsbeach98]

Rebadged no idea does that even work looks like the bottom chip is cracked

[MachineLearning]

Nov 18, 2022 0:59:24 GMT -5 Macsbeach98 said:

Rebadged no idea does that even work looks like the bottom chip is cracked

It does work, yup that's just a line where the adhesive ends (half of it came off and the rest stayed).

[Macsbeach98]

Ah Ok so what are you testing it in the A8N32SLI-Deluxe I hope.

[MachineLearning]

Nov 18, 2022 4:08:25 GMT -5 Macsbeach98 said:

Ah Ok so what are you testing it in the A8N32SLI-Deluxe I hope.

That's right - I just need to figure out an odd issue: XP freezes when I try to install it. After loading all files, after a certain amount of time it totally locks up. I know there's nothing wrong with the setup since it works just fine with Windows 7 (installed from another motherboard). The BIOS it came with was 0903 though which is a bit early so maybe that's a known issue.

The latest BIOS has this as a note, "Fix the system is unable to enter OS when USB flash drive is connected under Windows XP SP3", although I did try the system with 0 USB devices installed. Just takes some more trial and error I think.

In other news, the Micron 5B-G & one of the AT-6 sticks arrived today so I can start playing with them soon. All JEDEC PCBs or at least I'm assuming since they have the spot for a spare center ECC chip.

Does single vs. dual rank matter for DDR1?