[SOLVED] RAM speed vs CPU supported RAM speeds ?

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Ootsie87

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Jan 12, 2020
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Hi guys,

I have an Intel i5 10600K that has a maximum supported memory speed (at factory settings) of 2666 MHz.

I have 2 x 16GB sticks of Corsair Dominator RAM & 3200 MHz.

This was the one oversight I made when building my rig and in the near future I'll upgrade my CPU to something that can fully utilise my RAM.

The question I have is this - if I set my RAM at full speed, can this be harmful at all to my system? Or is it simply a case that my CPU will throttle the RAM speed accordingly and the system will run perfectly happily?

My motherboard is an Asus ROG Strix z490 e gaming.

Many thanks in advance for help with a basic question!
 
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Bazzy 505
Ootsie87 said:
Thank you. How can I check that I'm in gearmode 2? Would you assume that would have been enabled in the XMP profile?
Click to expand...

just enable XMP in bios, leave rest memory settings to auto, and motherboard will take care of rest.
when you boot to windows, run cpu-z https://www.cpuid.com/softwares/cpu-z.html and click on the memory tab. It will detail the current operation mode of memory installed.
Don't be alarmed DRAM frequency displaying 1600mhz. It is correct as it's Double data rate memory so effective speed is 3200 (for the sake of simplicity).
Furthermore if you click on SPD tab, supported modes for the memory installed will be listed there, along with current operating mode of memory in each slot...
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lvt said:
3200Mhz usually means the max speed that your RAM can run (it doesn't have to run at that speed).

At 2666Mhz (speed that the CPU supports) the RAM should run with greater stability and cooler => will last much longer.
Click to expand...

Thanks for your response mate. The only problem is that I'm really not comfortable manually tweaking things in the BIOS. When I enabled the XMP profile it set it to 3200 MHz with the correct maximum timings and voltages.

So the only negative effect if I run it at 3200 is reducing the lifespan of my RAM eventually? My PC runs very cool with 8 case fans so I'm not to worried about temperatures. What sort of instability could I see?
 
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If it works, it works, til the end of time (til your next PC). Theres something weird (to me) about motherboards for Intel and RAM support. Z-series should support highspeed RAM but the cheap mobos with the other chipsets, B560 or H510, don't.
As long as you are on a Z590 mobo, RAM should work.
H510 looks to be 3200 Mhz, B560 either 2933 or 3200, Z590 is 3200 up to 5000+.
 
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lvt said:
It doesn't matter as the memory controller is likely to downclock your RAM speed to match the system speed (CPU, FSB).
Click to expand...

This is what I thought. Thanks for confirming. It seems as though a lot of the 10th gen Intel CPUs only support up to 2666 MHz which I find quite odd. Looks like I need to go for an 11th gen to fully utilise my RAM....

Last question guys. Based on the info in my 1st post do you think I could be bottlenecking my new Asus ROG Strix 3080Ti OC? Or should my CPU and RAM speed be sufficient?
 
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Ootsie87 said:
The question I have is this - if I set my RAM at full speed, can this be harmful at all to my system?
Or is it simply a case that my CPU will throttle the RAM speed accordingly and the system will run perfectly happily?
Click to expand...
z490 supports memory overclocking.
If your ram is rated for 3200mhz operation, then that's what you should run it at. No, it doesn't reduce lifespan of the ram.
And no, there's no throttling (unless overheating is happening).
 
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Ootsie87 said:
Hi guys,

I have an Intel i5 10600K that has a maximum supported memory speed (at factory settings) of 2666 MHz.

I have 2 x 16GB sticks of Corsair Dominator RAM & 3200 MHz.

This was the one oversight I made when building my rig and in the near future I'll upgrade my CPU to something that can fully utilise my RAM.

The question I have is this - if I set my RAM at full speed, can this be harmful at all to my system? Or is it simply a case that my CPU will throttle the RAM speed accordingly and the system will run perfectly happily?

My motherboard is an Asus ROG Strix z490 e gaming.

Many thanks in advance for help with a basic question!
Click to expand...
Enable xmp in the bios.
Boot windows.
Open task manager/memory.
What does it show for ram speed?
 
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lvt said:
You shouldn't expect your RAM to run at higher speed than the CPU or motherboard speed, it will always run at the lowest speed of those two.
Click to expand...
Ok smartypants. Then question for you:
cpu i5-10600K - supports DDR4-2666mhz without overclocking,​
motherboard Asus ROG Strix z490 e gaming - supports ram up to 4800mhz with overclocking,​
ram DDR4 3200mhz - supports 3200mhz.​
​
At what speed will ram work with XMP on?
a) 2666mhz​
b) 4800mhz​
c) 3200mhz​
 
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SkyNetRising said:
Ok smartypants. Then question for you:
cpu i5-10600K - supports DDR4-2666mhz without overclocking,​
motherboard Asus ROG Strix z490 e gaming - supports ram up to 4800mhz with overclocking,​
ram DDR4 3200mhz - supports 3200mhz.​
​
At what speed will ram work with XMP on?
a) 2666mhz​
b) 4800mhz​
c) 3200mhz​
Click to expand...

it's none of the above 😉

d.) memory will run at 400 mhz , and bus clock will sit at 1600 mhz
 
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Ok now I'm just confused 😂 can someone kindly summarise in simplistic terms please? 😃

If I've understood properly then:

  1. There's no issue running my RAM at 3200 MHz
  2. My CPU will throttle the speed to its highest supported speed
  3. This won't harm my system in any way
  4. My specs shouldn't bottleneck my new GPU? This is the bit I'd love more clarity on

Cheers
 
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SkyNetRising said:
Ok smartypants. Then question for you:
cpu i5-10600K - supports DDR4-2666mhz without overclocking,​
motherboard Asus ROG Strix z490 e gaming - supports ram up to 4800mhz with overclocking,​
ram DDR4 3200mhz - supports 3200mhz.​
​
At what speed will ram work with XMP on?
a) 2666mhz​
b) 4800mhz​
c) 3200mhz​
Click to expand...

You are likely to create a confusion between "what speed the RAM could work" with "what speed the RAM actually works", the later seems to relates more to the original subject of this topic.

I will politely skip the question, for me it's simple, RAM will work at the speed the controller wants it to work, it means the lowest speed that the CPU or motherboard has.
 
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Ootsie87 said:
1. There's no issue running my RAM at 3200 MHz
Click to expand...
Yes.
Ootsie87 said:
2. My CPU will throttle the speed to its highest supported speed
Click to expand...
On motherboard, that doesn't support ram overclocking - Yes.
On motherboard that supports ram overclocking - No.
Ootsie87 said:
3. This won't harm my system in any way
Click to expand...
Yes.
Ootsie87 said:
4.My specs shouldn't bottleneck my new GPU? This is the bit I'd love more clarity on
Click to expand...
Not sure. What is your GPU?
Oh - it's 3080Ti. No there should be no problems.
You should edit your initial post and add gpu info there.
 
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SkyNetRising said:
Yes.

On motherboard, that doesn't support ram overclocking - Yes.
On motherboard that supports ram overclocking - No.

Yes.

Not sure. What is your GPU?
Oh - it's 3080Ti. No there should be no problems.
You should edit your initial post and add gpu info there.
Click to expand...

I did outline above but it's an Asus ROG Strix 3080Ti OC.

My mobo does support overclocking. When I activated the XMP profile it set my ram speed, timings and voltage to the proper maximum levels and my RAM now shows as 3200 MHz in task manager and in Corsair iCUE.
 
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Thanks so much for all of the input guys. I really appreciate it.

I found this post which explains my situation well in terms of the standard applied settings. What do you make of his comments around 10th gen Intel's actually being able to process much higher memory speeds than advertised?

Here's the post:

By default Intel’s CPUs support up to 2666MHz (or 2933MHz, in the case of 10th-gen i7 and i9 CPUs) on non-overclockable motherboards (those with the H- series, Q-series, or B-series chipsets, such as H310 or B460), but it can run at higher speeds on overclockable Z-series motherboards (e.g. Z370, Z490).
When first installed, RAM will default to its slow “JEDEC” memory spec (usually 2133MHz) and you will need to enable XMP or manually set it to a faster speed in BIOS. This is the case for all motherboards, whether they can be overclocked or not.
Intel does not guarantee that their processors will run at memory speeds higher than their specification, but in practice their 9th and 10th-generation CPUs can easily run with memory up to around 4600MHz (and sometimes even higher), as long as the memory kit and motherboard are good enough. There is no significant risk of damaging the CPU from memory overclocking unless you change the voltage setting of the memory controller (usually labelled “VTT” or “IMC” in BIOS).
https://www.quora.com/Do-Ryzen-processors-work-better-with-2666MHz-RAM-or-3200MHz-RAM
 
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Ootsie87 said:
Ok now I'm just confused 😂 can someone kindly summarise in simplistic terms please? 😃

If I've understood properly then:

  1. There's no issue running my RAM at 3200 MHz
  2. My CPU will throttle the speed to its highest supported speed
  3. This won't harm my system in any way
  4. My specs shouldn't bottleneck my new GPU? This is the bit I'd love more clarity on
Cheers
Click to expand...
Lots of things going on here but lemme try to summarize this for you.

1. Where the CPU supported RAM is stated, it means the base speed that the CPU can support. You go any lower and the CPU will simply not work. What you see on the Intel page is your base speed. That does not mean it wont work at 4000mhz.

2. Chipset speed is what the motherboard supports. Your board supports all of these speeds as per manufacturer spec. sheet...
Memory
4 x DIMM, Max. 128GB, DDR4 4600(O.C)/4500(O.C)/4400(O.C)/4266(O.C.)/4133(O.C.)/4000(O.C.)/3866(O.C.)/3733(O.C.)/3600(O.C.)/3466(O.C.)/3333(O.C.)/3200(O.C.)/3000(O.C.)/2933(O.C.)/2800(O.C.)/2666/2400/2133 MHz Non-ECC, Un-buffered Memory
OptiMem II
* 10th Gen Intel® Core™i9/i7 CPUs support 2933/2800/2666/2400/2133 natively, Refer to www.asus.com for the Memory QVL (Qualified Vendors Lists).
Dual Channel Memory Architecture

3. When you install any memory on that board, lets say 3200mhz it will run at a DDR4 base speed of 2133mhz unless otherwise stated. Only when you enable XMP will it run at its rated speed.

4. On Z490 chipset you can overclock it further if you want through memory tuning.

And none of the above affects any component in your PC. None of this has to do anything with CPU speed directly either.
 
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Hellfire13 said:
Lots of things going on here but lemme try to summarize this for you.

1. Where the CPU supported RAM is stated, it means the base sped that the CPU can support. You go any lower and the CPU will simply not work. What you see on the Intel page is your base speed. That does not mean it wont work at 4000mhz.

2. Chipset speed is what the motherboard supports. Your board supports all of these speeds as per manufacturer spec. sheet...
Memory
4 x DIMM, Max. 128GB, DDR4 4600(O.C)/4500(O.C)/4400(O.C)/4266(O.C.)/4133(O.C.)/4000(O.C.)/3866(O.C.)/3733(O.C.)/3600(O.C.)/3466(O.C.)/3333(O.C.)/3200(O.C.)/3000(O.C.)/2933(O.C.)/2800(O.C.)/2666/2400/2133 MHz Non-ECC, Un-buffered Memory
OptiMem II
* 10th Gen Intel® Core™i9/i7 CPUs support 2933/2800/2666/2400/2133 natively, Refer to www.asus.com for the Memory QVL (Qualified Vendors Lists).
Dual Channel Memory Architecture

3. When you install any memory on that board, lets say 3200mhz it will run at a DDR4 base speed of 2133mhz unless otherwise stated. Only when you enable XMP will it run at its rated speed.

4. On Z490 chipset you can overclock it further if you want through memory tuning.

And none of the above affects any component in your PC. None of this has to do anything with CPU speed directly either.
Click to expand...

Thank you! This makes absolute sense! So my CPU isn't bottlenecking my RAM speed at all then?

That's exactly what was going on for me. My RAM was running at 2133mhz. After enabled the XMP profile in my bios it was set to it's proper maximum settings.
 
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