Unstable system after recent hardware change

[Mr Kami]

I am having some problems with my system stability after changing my RAM memory.
I was using 2gigx4 of Kingston 1333mhz and decided to upgrade a little and bought myself 2gigx4 of 1600mhz Crucial BallistiX.
After a bit of setbacks during the installation of the new memories (i did not pair them correctly the first time around) the computer finally booted and i got into windows.
I had set my memories to run in 1600mhz from bios and at first i did not notice anything out of the ordinary but after a couple of hours my computer started having problems in form of Explorer crashing every 10minutes or so and refering to something in the temp registry.
I did run a registry clean after this but nothing changed,i used CCleaner.
I suspected setting the memories to 1600mhz was the cause of this so i set them to run at 1333mhz with no improvement.
Today ive had two bluescreens first saying something about bad headers and the second i cant remember i just got tired and switched back to my old memories and problem solved the system got stable again.

Now my question is what would be the cause of this system unstability with the BallistiX memories?
The pairing of the "new" memories im not to sure about since the serial numbers are identical on all 4 sticks i cant really understand what would be the right pairing so i switched them around and figured as long as the computer boots it must be right?
As far as i know the Crucial BallistiX memories should be perfectly compatible with my motherboard and processor.

My system specs,
Win7 64 Home
Amd Phenom II x6
8gig ddr3 ram
GTX 580
MSI 890FXA-GD70 Socket-AM3

Help appreciated!

[Crazyeyesreaper]

put memtest on a cd and run it to test the ram,

but since your on a Phenom II i can tell you right now the 1600mhz ram wont do you any good

after 1333mhz CL7 phenom IIs gain nothing in bandwidth, lower timings = better then higher speeds, with the Phenom II line

you might have to bump the CPU / Northbridge volts up as your running 4 sticks of ram correct, push the CPU/ NB up to 1.25v

i will also tell you this upping the Northbridge speed from stock of 2000 to 2600-2800 will be needed as for proper ram speeds to make any impact the Northbridge should be double the ram speed

so 1333 cl7 you need 2400-2600mhz NB to get proper speed from the ram.

all the above info and more can be found here
http://www.techpowerup.com/forums/sh...ad.php?t=79551
but again put memtest on a cd or bootable usb boot to it let it run 10 passes at the rated timings for your ram if it fails up the CPU/ NB volts to 1.25v run memtest again if its still unstable then 1 of the sticks is faulty,

but again going to 1600mhz DDR3 wont make any difference on performance period nothing nadda zip,

[Devilmaypoop]

but since your on a Phenom II i can tell you right now the 1600mhz ram wont do you any good

after 1333mhz CL7 phenom IIs gain nothing in bandwidth, lower timings = better then higher speeds, with the Phenom II line

Actually, until 1600mhz speed is better than lower timings for PII's, but after that more speed is useless and lower timings better.

My 1333mhz 2x2gb kit at 6-6-6-15 is way slower in bandwidth than at 1467mhz at 7-7-7-20, and has higher latency too than overclocked with looser timings.

But you're right on the 4 sticks of ram part, because the IMC on the PII cant handle it too well, so it needs more voltage.

[Crazyeyesreaper]

i have the opposite 1450 is fine 1600 or higher is worthless, i can maintain 676 at 1450 if i want the problem is my northbridge dosent like 2800mhz wont pass stress testing the bandwidth is there the problem is North bridge speed directly controlls the L3 cache speed cl 7 1333 with 2600mhz nb results in a perfect 1to1 ratio with low latency making the system a bit more responsive, 1600+ does nothing the difference between 1450 and 1600 is about 200-250mb of bandwidth, which dosent add any performance on the system overall.

its also one of the reasons dual gpu scaling on AMD isnt that good, the gpus need more system ram bandwidth and almost any intell setup from 1155 1156 and 1336 offer far better bandwidth with the same sets of ram, the IMC just isnt worth a damn.

as seen here
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...r3,2319-5.html
as you can see scaling past 1333 is pretty much worthless not to mention the 1333mhz CL7 offered the best gaming performance overall
now compare that to
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...i7,2325-5.html
where from 1333 to 1600 amd gained 400mb of bandwidth the i7 is able to gain 3000mb even removed triple channel aspect its still around 2000mb for the next step up vs 400 on the amd side.

1333mhz just happens to be the Phenom II lines sweetspot all 4 ram slots with a slight bump can be populated for up 16gb of ram and if you can push 1333mhz 7 7 7 or 7 8 7 you can set the NB to 2600 and get a 1 to 1 ratio that offered the best overall. i mean yes theres gains to be had pushing to extremes but on a Phenom II CPU if your pushing that hard you should have just bought intel to begin with

[Devilmaypoop]

I see. I especially went for high NB OC on my 1055T, going for 275 FSB so I can get a sweet 2750mhz NB and 3300mhz cpu undervolted to 1.125v. Much more faster than with CPU at 3500mhz and NB at 2500mhz.

[Crazyeyesreaper]

exactly cpu clock dosent do a whole not for Phenom IIs its the NB thats key.

a few of my friends got there 1090Ts at 4.2ghz and 3ghz NB, there ram is at or around 1500+ at cl7 which gives them that nice 1to1 ratio again and in that situation bandwidth gets enough of a boost to be worth while. took alot of playing with bios settings to get it stable though.

Im just hoping AMD's Bulldozer chips in june have a far better IMC, there new default ram speed is suppose to be 1866mhz, which if true would be a good jump in bandwidth, especially with overclocking involved. but only time will tell.

I can say tho that your clocks are decent for that they are. and the ram at 1450+ with cl7 is good as well. most ppl try and pump the ram speed to the 1700-2000mhz ram like on intel but they loosen there timings so damn much its worthless. but since theyre former intel users most often times they think they know AMD overclocking better then amd users lol.