X9DRL 1600MHz compatible UDIMM

Notice: Page may contain affiliate links for which we may earn a small commission through services like Amazon Affiliates or Skimlinks.

renderfarmer

Member
Feb 22, 2013
249
1
18
New Jersey
It has nothing to do with BIOS. Actually, the memory speed is controlled by your CPU so if you have, say, E5-2620 then the max you're going to have is 1333Mhz even with 1600Mhz. You will see 1600Mhz when you start to use E5-2650 and above. Also, if you have more than 2 quad rank DIMMs per channel then you might see your 1333Mhz automatically downgraded to 1066Mhz since the processor can only see 8 logical ranks.
Thanks, Supermacro. That's quite helpful. That would explain why my E5-2620s would see any RAM at 1333MHz. But my E5-2670 CPUs also exhibit this behavior. Granted, these are C0 ES CPUs, but, they work at 1600MHz just fine with 8GB RDIMMs that I have.

Perhaps I should look more carefully at the similarities and differences between the RDIMMs that work and the UDIMMs that don't. Thanks again.
 

renderfarmer

Member
Feb 22, 2013
249
1
18
New Jersey
Finally solved it. It wasn't the CPU, or the BIOS. It was the RAM.

I just got some dirt cheap bog standard HP Smart Buy RAM (Hynix) and it works in all of my motherboards at 1600MHz using "auto" settings in the BIOS.

Here are links to some HWinfo64 specs for the Hynix RAM that works @1600MHz and some Gskill Ares RAM that only works at 1333MHz for me.

It looks like the main difference is that the Gskill's 800MHz settings are coded in its XMP settings, while the Hynix RAM has a normally supported 800MHz mode...

The moral of the story is, avoid enthusiast RAM for your server.

Thanks for everyone's feedback and interest in this issue.

I posted a link to the Hynix RAM I got from Provantage in the Great Deals forum.
 

wyluliraven

Member
Nov 6, 2012
114
0
16
Atlanta, GA
Interesting results. All of my testing has been with RDIMM memory and none of them can be forced to run above 1333MHz. Registered ECC 1600MHz for clairification.
 

nitrobass24

Moderator
Dec 26, 2010
1,087
131
63
TX
Finally solved it. It wasn't the CPU, or the BIOS. It was the RAM.

I just got some dirt cheap bog standard HP Smart Buy RAM (Hynix) and it works in all of my motherboards at 1600MHz using "auto" settings in the BIOS.

Here are links to some HWinfo64 specs for the Hynix RAM that works @1600MHz and some Gskill Ares RAM that only works at 1333MHz for me.

It looks like the main difference is that the Gskill's 800MHz settings are coded in its XMP settings, while the Hynix RAM has a normally supported 800MHz mode...

The moral of the story is, avoid enthusiast RAM for your server.

Thanks for everyone's feedback and interest in this issue.

I posted a link to the Hynix RAM I got from Provantage in the Great Deals forum.
Well that is great you found RAM that works, but it still does not explain why the others do not, because the module characteristics are identical.

Would love to see what SM has to say about this.
 

renderfarmer

Member
Feb 22, 2013
249
1
18
New Jersey
Well that is great you found RAM that works, but it still does not explain why the others do not, because the module characteristics are identical.

Would love to see what SM has to say about this.
My guess is that it's because of the XMP settings. It seems the SM board is looking at the supported timings @ info and ignoring the XMP profile. All within what the CPU's QPI will support.

In the case of the Hynix UDIMMs it says:

Supported Module Timing at 800.0 MHz:11-11-11-28
Supported Module Timing at 666.7 MHz:9-9-9-24
Supported Module Timing at 533.3 MHz:7-7-7-19
Supported Module Timing at 400.0 MHz:6-6-6-14

In the case of the Gskill it says:

Supported Module Timing at 666.7 MHz:9-9-9-24
Supported Module Timing at 533.3 MHz:7-7-7-20
Supported Module Timing at 400.0 MHz:6-6-6-15
Supported Module Timing at 333.3 MHz:5-5-5-12

That being said, I have no idea why wyluliraven can't get his RDIMMs to run at 1600MHz if they're rated at 1600MHz.

Im not holding my breath to hear back from SM on this issue...
 

TheBay

New Member
Feb 25, 2013
220
1
0
UK
Yes you did. Which is why I went ahead and bought the most no-frills RAM I could find I'm just glad you were right and I was finally able to solve this. Thanks again.
No probs :)

Glad you are getting somewhere with this, I should have mentioned XMP but didn't come to mind as it's only really used in consumer environments.

You are having more luck that me though, at least you can get ram, I have had 8gb sticks on back order for a month now, all suppliers in the UK have no stock of ECC Unregistered UDIMMS and I need to fill some boards :(

I've got one board full of Crucial stuff which is working well so don't want to try another brand (though even other brands have a lead time of 6 weeks)

Also been waiting 3 weeks for a SFF-8087 to SATA with Sideband!.

This country is hopeless for availability.
 

renderfarmer

Member
Feb 22, 2013
249
1
18
New Jersey
No probs :)

Glad you are getting somewhere with this, I should have mentioned XMP but didn't come to mind as it's only really used in consumer environments.

You are having more luck that me though, at least you can get ram, I have had 8gb sticks on back order for a month now, all suppliers in the UK have no stock of ECC Unregistered UDIMMS and I need to fill some boards :(

I've got one board full of Crucial stuff which is working well so don't want to try another brand (though even other brands have a lead time of 6 weeks)

Also been waiting 3 weeks for a SFF-8087 to SATA with Sideband!.

This country is hopeless for availability.
That sucks. I studied in the UK and I remember how tough and expecially expensive it was buying gear. My second year at Brunel I decided to put together my first proper DP workstation and it was actually cheaper to fly to San Francisco, stay with friends for a week, an dbring back parts with me in my luggage...

What models of RAM are you after and how many pieces?
 

TheBay

New Member
Feb 25, 2013
220
1
0
UK
That sucks. I studied in the UK and I remember how tough and expecially expensive it was buying gear. My second year at Brunel I decided to put together my first proper DP workstation and it was actually cheaper to fly to San Francisco, stay with friends for a week, an dbring back parts with me in my luggage...

What models of RAM are you after and how many pieces?
Yeah usually what's priced say 300usd is £300!, but was great for us with the conversion rate going on holiday as it was a 2:1 ratio, but it's a bit less than that now. My girlfriend is off to NY next week and wondering if there is anything she can grab while she is there :)

The memory is: Crucial CT102472BD160B 8GB 1600MHZ 1.35v UDIMM and waiting on 9 pieces, though had an e-mail this morning saying goods are being picked by the warehouse team instead of it saying an ETA for their stock is the 28th, so this sounds promising :)
 

renderfarmer

Member
Feb 22, 2013
249
1
18
New Jersey
Yeah usually what's priced say 300usd is £300!, but was great for us with the conversion rate going on holiday as it was a 2:1 ratio, but it's a bit less than that now. My girlfriend is off to NY next week and wondering if there is anything she can grab while she is there :)

The memory is: Crucial CT102472BD160B 8GB 1600MHZ 1.35v UDIMM and waiting on 9 pieces, though had an e-mail this morning saying goods are being picked by the warehouse team instead of it saying an ETA for their stock is the 28th, so this sounds promising :)
Be mindful of the 1.35V. All of my SM mobo manuals say that even RDIMM 1.35V won't run @ 1600.

As for picking some server RAM up in NYC that might be tougher than it sounds. Not many local places cater to that kind of clientele. But sounds like your orders are being processed so that's good news.
 

TheBay

New Member
Feb 25, 2013
220
1
0
UK
Cheers for that,

1.35 RDIMMS are flaky at best anyway :) And will downclock to a lower speed if X amount of slots populated.

Crucial state a range of 1.35v - 1.5v and claim its 100% compatible with this model of board and will stick by that as it's system specific memory.
I have had 32gb ticking away lovely in one box and no issues to report at all, which even though it's 1.35v a lot of people cannot even get the Kingston 8gb 1.5v sticks working!

Yeah NY isn't that good for components, unless there is a microcentre near by, but she won't know what's she's looking for. I may just get a few Apple products as they are much cheaper in the US!
 
Last edited:

renderfarmer

Member
Feb 22, 2013
249
1
18
New Jersey
Thought I'd let everyone know that not all Supermicro boards will do 1600MHz with UDIMMs. All of my X9DRL boards will, but they have only 8 slots total (2 per channel). My one 16 slots board, the X9DRW, won't do 1600 with the very same DIMMs. The Manual says as much, 1066/1333 only for UDIMMs.

Supermicro did eventually get back to me and they were quite quick with follow up emails. Though by then I had solved my own problem.