Can Ryzen first gen memory compatibility be solved by processor upgrade?

[Athan Immortal]

The TL:DR of this question is: Are the memory compatibility problems of Ryzen first gen: processor based, chipset based or motherboard based (might be the same thing). i.e if I upgrade my processor, will the memory compatibility be better?

Some more detail.

• Motherboard: Gigabyte X370 Gaming 5
• CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 1700X
• System Memory: 32GB Dual Channel 3200 (running at 2666mhz) Corsair Vengeance.

I bought my 1700X back in 2017 in the first wave of release, before we knew all the trouble with memory compatibility. At the time I snagged a good deal on a 32GB kit of Corsair Vengeance 3200.

To this day I've never gotten it to run at 3200mhz, the best I've managed is 2666mhz. I've tried increasing power, using AMD memory calculator, but it seems as if I drew the short straw on the memory chips. They're not Samsung Bdie which seemed to be the magic sauce at least for Ryzen First Gen.

I've recently been considering an upgrade to a 3700x or 3900x, because part of me buying this platform was the upgrade path.

So I was wondering whether Ryzen's memory pickiness was down to the chip, chipset or motherboard. Like if I upgrade to a 3900x, will my memory suddenly be more likely to go to 3200mhz, or is it the motherboard/chipset that causes this and I'll still be limited to 2666mhz.

Thanks for the help.

[Skiiwee29]

its a problem with the Memory controller physically on the IO Die of the CPU itself thats is/was problem. This was fixed on Zen+ and Zen 2 releases, or the 2XXX, 3XXX series Processors. 

[Athan Immortal]

Just now, Skiiwee29 said:

its a problem with the Memory controller physically on the IO Die of the CPU itself thats is/was problem. This was fixed on Zen+ and Zen 2 releases, or the 2XXX, 3XXX series Processors. 

So that would possibly mean just changing the processor might be enough then?

 

OK thanks for the reply. I know I'm still rolling the dice, but I feel a bit more confident about the upgrade possibility now.

[Skiiwee29]

Just now, Athan Immortal said:

So that would possibly mean just changing the processor might be enough then?

 

OK thanks for the reply. I know I'm still rolling the dice, but I feel a bit more confident about the upgrade possibility now.

Yes, an upgrade to a 3700x or 3900x should allow you to run your RAM at the rated 3200mhz speeds instead of 2666 that you're currently locked to. 

[Haro]

12 minutes ago, Athan Immortal said:

OK thanks for the reply. I know I'm still rolling the dice, but I feel a bit more confident about the upgrade possibility now.

Before upgrading 

If your happy with the performance have you tried to tinker with the soc voltage and dram voltage 

And do you have the latest bios 

But to answer your previous question, yes  better ram compatibility will be a thing with newer zen cpu's 

[For Science!]

22 minutes ago, Athan Immortal said:

So that would possibly mean just changing the processor might be enough then?

 

OK thanks for the reply. I know I'm still rolling the dice, but I feel a bit more confident about the upgrade possibility now.

This really is a luck roll in my opinion, I upgraded my 1700 on a X370 crosshair board to 3950X and I cannot even touch my memory setting out of stock. So in my case memory compatibility got worse with the upgrade, although the uplift in performance was still worth it nonetheless.

 

Prior to this, I was running 2933 MHz on the 1700 with tuned timings.

[Athan Immortal]

46 minutes ago, TofuHaroto said:

Before upgrading 

If your happy with the performance have you tried to tinker with the soc voltage and dram voltage 

And do you have the latest bios 

But to answer your previous question, yes  better ram compatibility will be a thing with newer zen cpu's 

Possibly not the SOC voltage, I don't remember doing that. In my previous BIOS revision I did have the ram voltage pumped up but it didn't help stability, it just wont boot at 2800mhz or higher.

 

But I'm not 100% happy with the performance anyway. The IPC improvements on Zen 2 really look worth it for gaming (recent Gamer's Nexus video was demonstrating it with a 1700 of all things, so it felt like it was shinging a light right on me), and 12 cores would be nice for rendering video and a few other tasks, though if the 3700x gets any cheaper I might just pocket the money and get that.

 

I was running the F22 BIOS. I updated to the F31 in preparation for going to F40 and beyond (the beta bios from Gigabyte with 3000 series support), however the computer gave me a real scare, taking a Loooong time to boot the first time, USB wasn't working on boot to windows (thankfully I had a mobile app that lets me use my screen like a mouse pad and was able to get into device manager and delete/scan hardware). So basically it made me a little gun shy, since I really was just upgrading the BIOS to check for memory improvements in a system that's otherwise been running fine for years, and thought i was maybe pushing my luck.

 

They added some extra granularity to the memory timings, and I was able to get 2733mhz, but I have had Rocket League lock up on me, as well as one blue screen when I was rendering a video, so I put it back to 2666mhz.

 

I may yet go to F40, but they don't mention memory improvements in the notes, but it would at least mean I was ready to drop in a 3000 series CPU if I wanted.

[Haro]

2 minutes ago, Athan Immortal said:

But I'm not 100% happy with the performance anyway. The IPC improvements on Zen 2 really look worth it for gaming

It's better everything really

Better interconnect and FCLK 

Better imc 

Better ipc 

Better fpu , it's basically a whole new thing

From the looks of it , it looks like you didn't get the best luck in silicon 

A 3900x should be around 350-400ish bucks and the 3700x should be around 50-70ish bucks cheaper 

Depends on your workload tho if you need the extra cores 

[Athan Immortal]

16 minutes ago, TofuHaroto said:

It's better everything really

Better interconnect and FCLK 

Better imc 

Better ipc 

Better fpu , it's basically a whole new thing

From the looks of it , it looks like you didn't get the best luck in silicon 

A 3900x should be around 350-400ish bucks and the 3700x should be around 50-70ish bucks cheaper 

Depends on your workload tho if you need the extra cores 

Yeah that's my thinking, you guys have been awesome, thanks so much for the help.

 

The 12 core would be a nice to have, I regularly render videos, and they benefit from being CPU rendered rather than GPU, despite how much faster the GPU can be, so there's a direct time saving there.

 

However here in the UK, the 3700x is £281, and the 3900x is £408-439. I don't think the 4 cores are worth £130 (~$160) more. The thing that really prompted me to get the answer to this whole question was that the 3900x for a brief 30 or so minutes was down to £389, at only just over £100 more, I was tempted since it may well last me 5 years with games starting to take advantage of more cores.

 

At least with the knowledge now, I can keep an eye out for a good deal on either CPU. If the 3700x hits ~£230-250 I might jump. Likewise if the 3900x were to fall to £350 I'd take it in a heartbeat. Fingers crossed the 4000 series does to the 3000, what 3000 did to 2000 pricing

[Haro]

1 minute ago, Athan Immortal said:

However here in the UK, the 3700x is £281,

That is a really good deal for this chip

 

1 minute ago, Athan Immortal said:

Likewise if the 3900x were to fall to £350 I'd take it in a heartbeat. Fingers crossed the 4000 series does to the 3000, what 3000 did to 2000 pricing

Zen 3 will most likely drop zen 2's prices 

If you want to wait then wait 

If you can't get a 3700x 

It won't disappoint