Posts on Overclocking and memory speed.
What does 5-5-5-15 mean?
CAS is the acronym for Latency Column Address Strobe - we all can look-up what latency is! **** ref to one of the posts linked below.
The Numbers:
These timing figures (5,5,5,15 - not the graphic above) were taken from the CPUID/CPU-Z utility running on my AMD Athlon X2 5770 machine.
I have made no attempts to overclock this machine.
Reading some of the posts on the Internet it would appear that there is much confusion regarding these figures. Some seem to imply that smaller the figures the better (fewer clock cycles to complete a processor operation) while others the higher the figures the faster the computer will perform.
In my experience, the higher numbers are associated with faster memory and performance. I have recently purchased 4G of DDR3 RAM that is rated at 9,9,9,27 and that is rated at 1600MHz.
My Intel E8400 computer with DDR2 RAM (400MHz) reports memory timings as: 5,5,5,18 with a CR of 2T.
My Netbook with an Intel Atom N280 processor and DDR2 RAM reports: 4,4,4,12 - This netbook is definitely slower than either of the desktops!
My sub-notebook with DDR3 reports 7,7,7,20
Some Internet posters seem to indicate that there is a "magic" formula that you can use to adjust your memory timing in system BIOS to improve on the Auto settings that a non-overclocked useage would provide. Until it is determined what the figures actually mean there seems little point in changing them from their manufacturers specifications.
What does 5-5-5-15 mean?
CAS is the acronym for Latency Column Address Strobe - we all can look-up what latency is! **** ref to one of the posts linked below.
The Numbers:
- CL - CAS# Latency - in clocks - 5
- RAS to CAS Delay (tRCD) - 5
- TES Precharge - (tRP) - 5
- Cycle Time - (tRAS) - 15
These timing figures (5,5,5,15 - not the graphic above) were taken from the CPUID/CPU-Z utility running on my AMD Athlon X2 5770 machine.
I have made no attempts to overclock this machine.
Reading some of the posts on the Internet it would appear that there is much confusion regarding these figures. Some seem to imply that smaller the figures the better (fewer clock cycles to complete a processor operation) while others the higher the figures the faster the computer will perform.
In my experience, the higher numbers are associated with faster memory and performance. I have recently purchased 4G of DDR3 RAM that is rated at 9,9,9,27 and that is rated at 1600MHz.
My Intel E8400 computer with DDR2 RAM (400MHz) reports memory timings as: 5,5,5,18 with a CR of 2T.
My Netbook with an Intel Atom N280 processor and DDR2 RAM reports: 4,4,4,12 - This netbook is definitely slower than either of the desktops!
My sub-notebook with DDR3 reports 7,7,7,20
Some Internet posters seem to indicate that there is a "magic" formula that you can use to adjust your memory timing in system BIOS to improve on the Auto settings that a non-overclocked useage would provide. Until it is determined what the figures actually mean there seems little point in changing them from their manufacturers specifications.
- Some more links including those from Kingston, WikiP and Mushkin
- ***** Rather pompous (just like me!) post on overclock.com
- CPUID CPU-Z for how to view these characteristics for your processor
- Spec of the 1,600MHz RAM I purchased - from Kingston Website - has specs for timings and more
1 comment:
Thanks for the information - I was wondering what the numbers meant.
Can anyone explain how I can set these timings on my computer with Insyde H2O BIOS? I can't seem to see a screen in the setup where I can do this.
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