This is a follow up to this question.
I bought the motherboard mentioned in the question and a 2133 MHz RAM that does figure in the memory compatibility sheet of the board.
After assembling it runs on 1333 Mhz so to get my money's worth I have to overclock it. I think I know how but I need to know for sure that I'm doing the right thing.
The BIOS is a pretty fancy 3D mouse-enabled thing and looks very similar to this (NOT ACTUAL PHOTO OF MY BIOS):
I can increase System Memory Muliplier and hit 2133 MHz. I haven't done it just because I wanted to ask you this question:
Is this safe, and is this enough to unlock the full speed of my RAM?
Best Answer
That title asks for an opinion. Everyone will have their own.
If you are asking: I am going to OC it. Is this a correct way to do it?
Then you have the following options:
1) Optimal usage:
Read memory timing explanations on OC sites and HW sites such these: link, link, link, link, link and link.
Read and reread until you understand it. This is very much not trivial. You want to understand the meaning of half a dozen variables and the difference between latency and frequency. You want to know what all the values are in the screenshot below:
Or, you can you for a reasonable OC.
In that case start with enabling XMP. The results of that depend on the RAM (and the XMP profile stored in it) and the motherboard, but generally it will set it to a stable max speed configuration.
This will not be the fastest it can go, but it is the fastest the manufacturer will guarantee that it works. If you want more speed than that, go back to the HW sites.
Note that is is possible you copy the XMP timing and increase them slightly, but that is not guaranteed to work. You will have to test after each change, and proper testing is more than just running prime95 for a few hours.
Then again, if you do not mind a crash per month or per week in exchange for a few % more speed, do try. Just keep a good backup of all important data on your computer and then go have some fun.