Overclocking RAM causing computer crashes/restarts?

[Cdahl92]

So I just installed some new parts for my computer and everything was fine at first. Now when I play DOOM 2016 or even sometimes just browsing the internet my computer randomly restarts. On top of that when it DOES reboot it sometimes gets caught in the infinite Windows Logo loop. I have just installed 16GB of RAM that can run at 2133MHz DDR3. My old RAM was 2133MHz as well but was only 8GB total. Two 4G sticks vs the two 8G sticks I have installed now. When I reduce the speed to BIOS defaults everything runs fine. It's when I bump it up to the max is when I start having issues...

Specs are as follows:

AMD FX-8370 (NEW) With stock Wraith Cooler

GIGABYTE GA-990FX-Gaming AM3+ AMD 990FX MotherBoard (NEW)

CORSAIR Vengeance Pro 16GB (2 x 8GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 2133 (NEW) Running at 2134MHz

GeForce GTX 660 SC Video Card

120G SSD SATA

500G SATA HDD 7.6k

ThermalTake TR2-600W PSU

Any idea on why this is happening? Thank you all for the help :/
Side note, After running an HWMonitor, all of my temps are <40C when IDLE.

When I run Rocket League, sitting in the background the highest I'm seeing my temps go are <45-50C with the CPU at a MAX of about 45C

 

[PC-4LIFE]

If theres not enough voltage then RAM will crash, like any other component. But anyways, overclocking will not yield any noticeable performance increase. It's already at a high speed.

 

[Cdahl92]

If theres not enough voltage then RAM will crash, like any other component. But anyways, overclocking will not yield any noticeable performance increase. It's already at a high speed.

The issue is that I paid extra to get the 2133MHz RAM. And if I could OC it before with just the two 4G sticks, why is it causing my computer to restart everytime I OC the two 8G sticks that I just put in. It was never an issue before.

 

[PC-4LIFE]

If theres not enough voltage then RAM will crash, like any other component. But anyways, overclocking will not yield any noticeable performance increase. It's already at a high speed.

The issue is that I paid extra to get the 2133MHz RAM. And if I could OC it before with just the two 4G sticks, why is it causing my computer to restart everytime I OC the two 8G sticks that I just put in. It was never an issue before.

Are you putting the RAM on the max possible speed?

 

[Cdahl92]

If theres not enough voltage then RAM will crash, like any other component. But anyways, overclocking will not yield any noticeable performance increase. It's already at a high speed.

The issue is that I paid extra to get the 2133MHz RAM. And if I could OC it before with just the two 4G sticks, why is it causing my computer to restart everytime I OC the two 8G sticks that I just put in. It was never an issue before.

Are you putting the RAM on the max possible speed?

The RAM is only capable of going to 2133MHz. When I set the BIOS to run it at that speed it sets it to 2134MHz. Then the restarts happen

 

[PC-4LIFE]

If theres not enough voltage then RAM will crash, like any other component. But anyways, overclocking will not yield any noticeable performance increase. It's already at a high speed.

The issue is that I paid extra to get the 2133MHz RAM. And if I could OC it before with just the two 4G sticks, why is it causing my computer to restart everytime I OC the two 8G sticks that I just put in. It was never an issue before.

Are you putting the RAM on the max possible speed?

Wait so you overclocked your RAM from 2133


The RAM is only capable of going to 2133MHz. When I set the BIOS to run it at that speed it sets it to 2134MHz. Then the restarts happen

Wait so your RAM is going to 2134mhz from 2133? Wow, first of all that shouldn't be causing the crashes. There is virtually ZERO difference between the 2.

 

[Cdahl92]

Exactly, but when I change the BIOS settings back to "optimal" the RAM is sitting at 1366. And I have no restarts. Only when I put it to the max...

 

[BFG-9000]

More sticks and ranks of RAM increases the load on the memory controller so you can expect it to need more voltage to run at the same speed. In the old days it was easy to increase the MCH voltage by itself but with AMD it's part of the CPU vCore.

 

[Cdahl92]

More sticks and ranks of RAM increases the load on the memory controller so you can expect it to need more voltage to run at the same speed. In the old days it was easy to increase the MCH voltage by itself but with AMD it's part of the CPU vCore.

So now I'm getting a BIOS boot error when I try to set the RAM to 2133MHz. OR If it gets past that, the windows logo freezes and it doesn't boot. What can I do to fix this 🙁

 

[BFG-9000]

As I said, more voltage for the memory controller. You have to expect to need more voltage when overclocking anything, and if the voltage required is higher than you are comfortable with, reduce the speed to 1866 or 1600.

 

[Cdahl92]

As I said, more voltage for the memory controller. You have to expect to need more voltage when overclocking anything, and if the voltage required is higher than you are comfortable with, reduce the speed to 1866 or 1600.

The problem is this:

My mobo already has OC profiles on it.

In my original post I can OC the 8G to 2133MHz with no issues. Per the profile. When I use 16G, BIOS is saying there is an issue with clock speeds or something like that I will post a screenshot. If I could do it before with no problems, why now do i have issues and restarting/no boot etc?

 

[BFG-9000]

What part of more sticks or ranks of RAM increases the load on the memory controller do you not understand? You might even be able to set RAM at 2400 if you drop down to a single low-capacity stick.

OC profile is a canned OC setting that has nothing whatsoever to do with the actual hardware you have, which is luck-of-the-draw silicon lottery. Most of the time you will be able to set less voltage than the OC profile calls for but if you are unlucky the hardware will require more voltage, and if you are very unlucky won't be able to OC at all regardless of voltage. There are no guarantees with overclocking.

 

[Karadjgne]

Couple things. The default MC speed on an FX cpu is 1333 I believe, so understandable that under an OC profile the ram will default to 1366. That 2133 Corsair Pro should quite easily do 2400 under OC, 2133 isn't max, it's just the max tested and certified by that particular batch. With tweaks to dram voltage and timings its entirely possible it could reach 2800. Speaking of tweaks, this is where I believe the issue is. The saved OC profile. That profile was saved with the 8Gb of ram, which not only had different timings, but also different voltage requirements. You can't use that OC profile, or any of the others, except in 1 way. Swap the ram back out, load up the wanted profile. In bios, raise the dram voltage to 1.65v. Save the profile. Stick the 16Gb back in, it should have enough dram voltage now to boot at the 2133 setting that was prior to shutdown, so is now the current default.

On a side note, check the ram. Corsair, among others, has a nasty habit of selling all different voltages of ram. Some is 1.5v, some is 1.35v, some is 1.65v, yet they all look identical. If the new ram is 1.65v, you'll need to leave it at that in the new profile. If it's 1.5v you should be able to dial it back to 1.505v or maybe need 1.510v. You'll need to check the timings too, maybe need to set higher initially, or at least manually change if the setting for ram timings was not auto. No saying that the new ram isn't 10-11-10-30 while the old OC profile had a manual setting of 9-10-9-27 etc.

Swapping components and expecting them to work perfectly out of the box when dealing with OC is a fools errand.

 

[Cdahl92]

Couple things. The default MC speed on an FX cpu is 1333 I believe, so understandable that under an OC profile the ram will default to 1366. That 2133 Corsair Pro should quite easily do 2400 under OC, 2133 isn't max, it's just the max tested and certified by that particular batch. With tweaks to dram voltage and timings its entirely possible it could reach 2800. Speaking of tweaks, this is where I believe the issue is. The saved OC profile. That profile was saved with the 8Gb of ram, which not only had different timings, but also different voltage requirements. You can't use that OC profile, or any of the others, except in 1 way. Swap the ram back out, load up the wanted profile. In bios, raise the dram voltage to 1.65v. Save the profile. Stick the 16Gb back in, it should have enough dram voltage now to boot at the 2133 setting that was prior to shutdown, so is now the current default.

On a side note, check the ram. Corsair, among others, has a nasty habit of selling all different voltages of ram. Some is 1.5v, some is 1.35v, some is 1.65v, yet they all look identical. If the new ram is 1.65v, you'll need to leave it at that in the new profile. If it's 1.5v you should be able to dial it back to 1.505v or maybe need 1.510v. You'll need to check the timings too, maybe need to set higher initially, or at least manually change if the setting for ram timings was not auto. No saying that the new ram isn't 10-11-10-30 while the old OC profile had a manual setting of 9-10-9-27 etc.

Swapping components and expecting them to work perfectly out of the box when dealing with OC is a fools errand.

Thank you!!

This helps a ton, I will mess with the settings and see what happens. The profile I've been referring too has been reset already when I swapped out the RAM. And even when I try to change the MHz Speed or Voltage manually it still has the issue of not booting or giving me errors with boot within the BIOS. I'm still trying to get it to replicate so I can post screenshots. I'll update once I've tweaked it over again!

 

[Cdahl92]

Update, it was a power issue, when I OC to 2133 or more with the 16GB, it's taking just whatever was left and it's causing restarts. I have it sitting at 1866 with no issues currently, so that little boost from that to 2133 is causing power issues apparently, the voltage setting I set to 1.65V, and the computer wouldn't even get past the BIOS saying there was insufficient power going to the RAM slots.