Asrock 770 Extreme3 incompatible for some Memory modules

[D'Souza]

I have installed AMD Phenom II and corsair dominator 2x2 GB RAM on Asrock 770 Extreme3 motherboard. The specs of the memory are 9-9-9-24, 2T, 1600 MHz, 1.65V. I have got another kit and put them on first two memory slots. Now time to time the system shows BSOD when running prime95. The first memory modules were not working right on first memory slots slot and for that reason I have placed them on Secondary slots. Now I am able to bring the system back to stable condition. For that I have changed slight memory settings. Now the strange problem is, I have to load bios defaults everytime if I swap on memory slots and if I want to change memory settings. What kind of problem is this?

[Mayoor]

It would have been better if you have provided a complete system details here. Anyway, make sure that you are running latest BIOS for this motherboard and follow these settings:

• Overclock Mode to { Optimized }
• Spread Spectrum to { Disabled }
• Memory Clock to { 800 MhzDDR3_1600 }
• DRAM Voltage to { 1.65 volts }
• Memory Controller Mode to { Unganged }
• DRAM Timings to 9-9-9-30 (CL-TRCD-TRP-TRAS)
• MA Timing to { 2T }

I assume that this is a standard recommendation for 1600 Mhz DDR operation. The motherboard manual says that this motherboard could support maximum of 1800 Mhz DDR.

[LavinaD]

I solved the problem. My system was not stable when I first put new RAM modules on this motherboard. After changing power supply, fan on the NB, still have problems. Then i decided to buy a new bar, which is Kingston 1600. And then pc runs stable! Looking at soft overclocking using "Asrock Utility", I discovered that the Kingston ram running at 1.9 v! But if I manually select 1.65 V in the bios (before it was in Auto), the PC is again unstable. In fact, there's a difference of 0.25 V and less between the selected voltage in the bios and the actual voltage. So finally come to an assumption like this:

Actual voltage (1.65 V) voltage = manual in the bios (1.9) - 0.25 V.

[Akaashath]

If the memory is not in the list, this has not been tested. The worst that can happen is that the memory is not running or the system becomes unstable. The correct recognition might be DDR3 1333 as far as the AMD CPUs do not officially support DDR3 1600. However if you use more amount of RAM and low power SPU, then also the system can run unstable. This is because the CPU memory cache or controller could not able to access the right amount of memory module. So I urge you to install memory modules only either on first memory slots or on secondary memory slots. If still you are getting problem, then try with only single module at a time simply to test and run memtest for number of loops. Same follows remaining modules.