RAM Timings Right, here's a puzzler for you... I got an Athlon XP 3000+ with a shuttle FN-41 motherboard (nforce2). I got two chips of PC3200 ram totalling 768 (512 + 256). The ram is DDR400... however I can't get it to run at any speed above 300 without the machine becoming unstable, and crashing/freezing/resetting all over the place. It's not the ram... I'm running corsairs finest - the other chip is a 256mb one nass gave me and it does it even when I run the machine without it. I have a feeling it's the RAM timings (CAS) but I'm not sure. Anyone got any ideas?
Could well be but I'm not going to even start trying to explain how to set up ram timings, as I've forgotten. Might be worth trying nudging up the voltage to the ram a bit at a time and see if it stabilises.
4-4-8??? Wow thats high, certainly not Corsair Quality Timings. In the nForce boards you should match the ram channels also, they are very fickle about mis-matched DIMMS, ie 256MB in 1st Channel and 512 in 2+3, need to have same RAM size modules in each channel, preferably the same type. At DDR400 speeds [200Mhz] you should be expecting 2.5-3-2 Timings at least, 2-3-2 if it's top-quality CAS2 memory. I suspect that the fault may lie with the voltage options for your processor? It should be running at a vCore or 1.65V for standard operation to prevent crashes, and your memory should be 2.7V-2.8V for stability at DDR400 speeds
the board only has two ram slots - with it being shuttle it's extremely small: I've got the timings wrong - just looked at everest again, it recommends the following: 3.0-3-3-8 @ 200mhz 2.5-3-3-7 @ 166mhz 2.0-2-2-6 @ 150mhz
Ah right I see - I still think the problem is using mis-matched DIMMS in the memory. nForce 2 boards do not like mis-matched DIMMS it plays havock with the dual-channel, the new nForce 4's are a bit better about it and allow mis-matched DIMMS with the new rev E core processors. Try running at 200MHz with SPD timings with just the 512 stick in DIMM 1 and see if it will hit the correct frequency.
