Question I need help with OCing RAM ?

[David_676]

I had my memory OC'd to 3600 at CL14 using the XMP profile and after 1.5 years, my 5950x IMC got degraded pretty bad. I read that the VCCIO can be affected by certain ram settings. I don't know if it's just my MB that tries to auto adjust the IMC voltages or if that's even the case. I have been told that RAM settings shouldn't affect the CPU, but I suspect there is more to it.

My setup:
CPU: AMD Ryzen 9 5950x
MB: Asus x570 Crosshair VIII Hero (Wi-Fi)
RAM: 2x16 G.skill Trident Z Royal - F4-3600C14D-32GTRG
Cooler: Corsiar iCue H150i Elite Capellix
PSU: Be quiet! Straight Power 11 1000w
GPU: EVGA RTX 3080 FTW3
Storage: Samsung 980 Pro 2TB + 3 standard HDD's

I set the XMP profile on and enabled PBO and that was it as far as OC settings. Then after a year and a half my computer started locking up with the DRAM LED lit on the MB. I spent months trying different settings, setting everything to default and such, and the computer locked up every week or 2 instead of every 2 days, but it didn't fix the problem. My first suspect was the RAM so I RMA'd it and it still didn't fix it, so my next suspect was the PSU, I bought a cheap test PSU and that didn't fix it either, so I moved on to the MB, and RMA'd that, and the last thing I suspected was the CPU, I figured CPU's are fairly robust and if it works at all it's probably fine. But it turned out it was the IMC that got fried. I RMA'd that and just got the chip in last night. It is running fine now and I am trying to avoid killing the IMC again since it will be out of warranty soon.

Again, while troubleshooting on different threads here, I was told both that OC'ing the RAM would and wouldn't affect the CPU. Again, I head that the IMC voltages, VCCIO or similar AMD voltages if they are different, can be adjusted (to sometimes very high voltages) automatically, by the BIOS I would assume. But others have said that isn't the case. I noticed an OC spreadsheet for ddr4 that listed those IMC voltage settings, so I assume it's important to set those manually? I really don't know enough about Overclocking, and I could just run my RAM at stock settings but I really don't want to run expensive high end RAM at stock. I am looking for the most gentle but stable settings that will give me 3600 and not hurt the CPU, it seems that 3600 was the sweet spot for AMD so it seems that I should be able to reach that level without damaging the IMC.

I currently have it set to: 3600 16-16-16-36 at 1.4v and it's running fine so far, but what risk am I running with this.

Thoughts? Anything is helpful.

 

[Fix_that_Glitch]

Honestly computers these days are so powerful there really isn't a need to overclock cpu, change memory timings or overclock them. If you simply run the cpu at basic settings and use the xmp setting for the ram and leave it at that you will not have to worry about hurting any pc parts. The risk to reward ratio just isn't there anymore for current pc's.

 

[David_676]

Honestly computers these days are so powerful there really isn't a need to overclock cpu, change memory timings or overclock them. If you simply run the cpu at basic settings and use the xmp setting for the ram and leave it at that you will not have to worry about hurting any pc parts. The risk to reward ratio just isn't there anymore for current pc's.

That is all I would like to do at this point, but I think xmp is part of the (potential) problem, I don't really wanna go base speed at 2133 I think it defaults to, but I am trying to find out if 1.45v from the xmp is causing my BIOS to raise my VCCIO and VCCSA and such, which I think is VTTDDR on my board.

I found this video last night that seems to show the this on a similar board:

View: https://youtu.be/b4ss2eeJcTc


So there must be a link between the 2 voltages, but I don't think 0.725v VCCIO is very high for a 1.45v DRAM.
Maybe I just got a bad chip and the IMC going bad had nothing to do with any of this, I just want to confirm that that is the case and that I am ok to run xmp and not have it die in another 1.5 years. I will likely lower the timings to CL16 just because I think CL14 is a bit much for Ryzen anyway.

But I just need to know if it was a fluke or if that XMP made my IMC degrade that fast. Thank you for your input, now that I have all new parts, I am just gonna run it all stock accept (hopefully) the RAM XMP.

 

[David_676]

After a ton of searching and very unclear answers, I think I have found the answer, I stumbled across this OC Guide that says this:

• One common limiting factor for the maximum safe voltage you can operate is your CPU's architecture. According to JEDEC, VDDQ, the voltage of data output, is tied to VDD, colloquially referred to as VDIMM or DRAM Voltage. This voltage interacts with the PHY or Physical Layer present on the CPU and may lead to long-term degradation of the IMC if set too high. As a result, daily use of VDIMM voltages above 1.60 V on Ryzen 3000 and 5000 and 1.65 V on Intel Consumer Lake-series Processors is not advisable as CPU degradation of the PHY is difficult to measure or notice until the issue becomes serious.

So it seems that the IMC is affected by the DRAM voltage, but the recommended daily driver maximum was 1.65v and I was running at the XMP of 1.45v. So if it was the OC that caused my problems, it had to have been a bad bin for it to degrade that fast. I think I am going to just run XMP and hope that this replacement CPU is a better bin and doesn't degrade early again. I may also set a small undervolt in CO just for the sake of temps and avoid PBO and Auto OC.

 

[SkyNetRising]

I was running at the XMP of 1.45v. So if it was the OC that caused my problems

I'd reduce DDR voltage to 1.35V.

 

[David_676]

I'd reduce DDR voltage to 1.35V.

I'll give it a try, but it's Samsung B-die and CL14, it may not be enough. I'll try it tho, I would like to run it as low as possible.

UPDATE: 1.35 did not post, 1.38 was the lowest I could get to post and it would run at load, but I set it to 1.39 just to give myself a little room for stability. I'll just have to see if it's stable long term.

 

[lolvatveo]

set right ram timing is inportant more than increase voltage, I remember can overclock my ddr2 from 667 to 1000mhz at same voltage by just set the perfect ram timing for it. high timing and voltage not always make ram more stable. you also need good cpu has a good i/o controller, you may want to overclock cpu ring ratio (i/o) to stable at high frequency ram

 

[Misgar]

What observable benefit did you get by degrading an expensive CPU to the point where needed replacing after 18 months? Did your apps benefit significantly from pushing XMP RAM voltages past 1.35V?

I'm running 2 x 32GB DDR5 DIMMs at 1.20V and 4800MT/s (not XMP) on my 7950X rig, in the hope it will still be working in 3 to 4 years time. Who knows, my next CPU might be a Threadripper, if I can justify the cost.

 

[sycoreaper]

What observable benefit did you get by degrading an expensive CPU to the point where needed replacing after 18 months? Did your apps benefit significantly from pushing XMP RAM voltages past 1.35V?

I'm running 2 x 32GB DDR5 DIMMs at 1.20V and 4800MT/s (not XMP) on my 7950X rig, in the hope it will still be working in 3 to 4 years time. Who knows, my next CPU might be a Threadripper, if I can justify the cost.

Where did you pull that nonsense from? Responsible overclocking will not shorten the life by any meaningful amount of time.

 

[Misgar]

"Where did you pull that nonsense from."

The OP said he'd damaged the IMC in his 5950X by overvolting the memory and RMA'd the mobo, the RAM and the CPU before he worked out what was wrong.

Perhaps that means he didn't perform a "responsible" overclock?

 

[lolvatveo]

Overclocking is necessary when there is a headroom for it, overclock cpu with overvoltage has less risk than ram because, I used to think ddr1 ram can use 2.2v to 2.5v voltage and why I worry push ddr4 ram voltage to the high level to overclock ? I tried it and it crashed after a few days of use, which caused it to only run at normal levels without any xmp or any overclocking set. The ddr4 ICs are only designed to run at low voltage 1.2v so it is more vulnerable than ddr1/2. Also modern cpu's smoke electricity very much, it's actually very easy to reach 100°C even though the voltage is low, so I never let the cpu voltage go above 1.3625v-1.4v. Previously I could overclock for daily use with 1.4v ivy bridge with water cooler or 1.45v sk775 cpu