Question Help Me Understand RAM Overclocking (Scenarios included)

[zomboromano]

I want to understand some basics with overclocking, I'm fairly new to it.

A few months ago I bought an HP laptop, that used the Ryzen 4500u processor. It natively ran ram at 3200 MHz. I replaced the one stick with two sticks of 3200 MHz ram, and it ran no problem.

Was any of the RAM ever overclocked? Who knows.

Well recently I got an HP Omen 30L Desktop. It comes with 1 8GB Hyperx Fury stick at 8GB of RAM. Apparently buying two of the same exact sticks of RAM from Amazon, if you do that they will not clock in at 3200 MHz but 2666. So people asked why through Best Buy question and answers, and HP said that the computer only supports RAM up to 2666 MHz.

The BIOS does not allow overclocking or XMP.

So I saw 3200 MHz Corsair Vengance RAM on sale for the same price as the 2666 RAM. I thought I would just buy the 3200 MHz RAM and it would downlock to 2666 MHz. But instead of doing that it downlocked to like 2166 MHZ.

Question one: Can someone make sense of any of this for me? Why would the original HP stick work at 3200 MHz somehow but not other sticks of RAM that are able to work that high? And why did my 3200 MHz RAM clock in at 2166?

Question two: After all of this, I opened up Ryzen command center, and I used that to set my RAM to clock in at 1600 (half of 3200) and after a reboot, my RAM is successfully clocked in at 3200 MHz. I don't quite understand how Ryzen Master accomplishes this. Is Ryzen Master constantly running in the background? Would these changes still be in affect if somehow I uninstalled Ryzen Master?

Final question: In my mind, I bought RAM that is supposed to go up to 3200 MHz. So I didn't see any issue with it being at a higher speed. But forcing it up to 3200 MHz through Ryzen master makes me worry about overheating or other issues. Will this create too much heat, or will this create much more wear on the parts in my computer? I just want to make sure that overclocking in this way is safe.

Again, I am a noobie, so answering these 3 questions will help me understand so much more about RAM. Thank you!

 

[CountMike]

I want to understand some basics with overclocking, I'm fairly new to it.

A few months ago I bought an HP laptop, that used the Ryzen 4500u processor. It natively ran ram at 3200 MHz. I replaced the one stick with two sticks of 3200 MHz ram, and it ran no problem.

Was any of the RAM ever overclocked? Who knows.

Well recently I got an HP Omen 30L Desktop. It comes with 1 8GB Hyperx Fury stick at 8GB of RAM. Apparently buying two of the same exact sticks of RAM from Amazon, if you do that they will not clock in at 3200 MHz but 2666. So people asked why through Best Buy question and answers, and HP said that the computer only supports RAM up to 2666 MHz.

The BIOS does not allow overclocking or XMP.

So I saw 3200 MHz Corsair Vengance RAM on sale for the same price as the 2666 RAM. I thought I would just buy the 3200 MHz RAM and it would downlock to 2666 MHz. But instead of doing that it downlocked to like 2166 MHZ.

Question one: Can someone make sense of any of this for me? Why would the original HP stick work at 3200 MHz somehow but not other sticks of RAM that are able to work that high? And why did my 3200 MHz RAM clock in at 2166?

Question two: After all of this, I opened up Ryzen command center, and I used that to set my RAM to clock in at 1600 (half of 3200) and after a reboot, my RAM is successfully clocked in at 3200 MHz. I don't quite understand how Ryzen Master accomplishes this. Is Ryzen Master constantly running in the background? Would these changes still be in affect if somehow I uninstalled Ryzen Master?

Final question: In my mind, I bought RAM that is supposed to go up to 3200 MHz. So I didn't see any issue with it being at a higher speed. But forcing it up to 3200 MHz through Ryzen master makes me worry about overheating or other issues. Will this create too much heat, or will this create much more wear on the parts in my computer? I just want to make sure that overclocking in this way is safe.

Again, I am a noobie, so answering these 3 questions will help me understand so much more about RAM. Thank you!

Much depends on your definition of RAM overclock. Most common DDR4 starts at 2133MHz effective clock as base clock and has XMP profile(s) up to frequency manufacturer has tested and deemed to be best safe and stable, that is not a classical overclock which would be only if you pushed it past it's XMP value. There is also matter of IMC (Internal Memory Controller) that is built in modern CPUs and pushing RAM past it's best value may also be considered OC but not RAM itself. Some can be OC-ed, some not, no matter what XMP is.
Ram also has to conform to JEDEC standards but together with XMP those are just instruction to BIOS how to set itself for given performance. In most case all those values can be set manually.
If you mix ram with different values, BIOS has to compromise (as much as it can) and that usually means setting to slower frequency and higher Cas and other latencies. that's why mixing RAM may not at all or just partially succeed. It's all up to BIOS and it's flexibility. Laptop's BIOS is usually quite poor in choices for settings.

 

[zomboromano]

Much depends on your definition of RAM overclock. Most common DDR4 starts at 2133MHz effective clock as base clock and has XMP profile(s) up to frequency manufacturer has tested and deemed to be best safe and stable, that is not a classical overclock which would be only if you pushed it past it's XMP value. There is also matter of IMC (Internal Memory Controller) that is built in modern CPUs and pushing RAM past it's best value may also be considered OC but not RAM itself. Some can be OC-ed, some not, no matter what XMP is.
Ram also has to conform to JEDEC standards but together with XMP those are just instruction to BIOS how to set itself for given performance. In most case all those values can be set manually.
If you mix ram with different values, BIOS has to compromise (as much as it can) and that usually means setting to slower frequency and higher Cas and other latencies. that's why mixing RAM may not at all or just partially succeed. It's all up to BIOS and it's flexibility. Laptop's BIOS is usually quite poor in choices for settings.

Any thoughts on my specific scenarios? I appreciate the knowledge, I'd like some specific stuff to help me understand.

I'd like to know if I bought RAM that is meant to go up to 3200, it's showing up in my system at 2100, if I overclock using Ryzen Master, rather than the BIOS, will that cause any problems or overheating, should I worry about any of my components? Any information on how Ryzen master does this? And if I uninstall the program what happens to the overclocking?

I'm also curious in general why my ram that was advertised at 3200 didn't automatically work in this system, if the original ram worked at 3200.

Keep in mind your speaking to someone that is somewhat of a layman. I know basic tech terms. I can put in a video card and an ssd, or even a power supply. But I might not understand all the terminology. Just trying to learn.

 

[CountMike]

Any thoughts on my specific scenarios? I appreciate the knowledge, I'd like some specific stuff to help me understand.

I'd like to know if I bought RAM that is meant to go up to 3200, it's showing up in my system at 2100, if I overclock using Ryzen Master, rather than the BIOS, will that cause any problems or overheating, should I worry about any of my components? Any information on how Ryzen master does this? And if I uninstall the program what happens to the overclocking?

I'm also curious in general why my ram that was advertised at 3200 didn't automatically work in this system, if the original ram worked at 3200.

Keep in mind your speaking to someone that is somewhat of a layman. I know basic tech terms. I can put in a video card and an ssd, or even a power supply. But I might not understand all the terminology. Just trying to learn.

As I said before, 3200MHz RAM can easily go to that frequency, that fact that it's now running at 2133MHz is because it wasn't set to use XMP because of BIOS settings. There's no danger of it overheating etc. as it's made to do at least that much although memory would have to work at higher voltage, most probably at 1.35v instead of 1.2v at slowest speed. Only real "danger" is instability that may occur if not totally successful.
Weather RM will succeed or not also depends on BIOS capability, you'll just have to try, no firm rules.

 

[zomboromano]

Anyone else with any other thoughts? No XMP options in the bios. Anything negative I'm bringing on by using Ryzen Master compared to the BIOS for RAM overclocking?

Any other thoughts?

 

[JSG3K]

Anyone else with any other thoughts? No XMP options in the bios. Anything negative I'm bringing on by using Ryzen Master compared to the BIOS for RAM overclocking?

Any other thoughts?

Did you ever just use ryzen master to raise ram speed? im in the same boat currently got the ryzen 5 3000 gtx 1660 super hp omen 30l and i have two sticks of corsair vengeance 16gb 3200 mhz that i want to put in but im apprehensive as this is my first gaming pc and i dont want to mess anything up.