how do i test to see true V to my ram?

I have a gigabyte p35c board.... I have read here and there that the settings you set isn't necessarily what the board gives to the ram.. So how can test to see what the true ram v is.. Last thing i need to do is set my mem-v via the board and fry my chips..

You have 2 choices and both require an accurate Digital Volt Meter (DVM).

Here is the pinout of the memory socket and what pin supplies what signal/voltage.

http://pinouts.ru/Memory/dimm_ddr2_pinout.shtml

Notice there are actually a couple of voltages but Vref is what I believe you are interested in.

Notice too that the ground pin is opposite the voltage pin in several cases making taking the measurement somthing that should be done with care to prevent shorts.

You should be able to measure whatever you wish at an unpopulated memory slot.

It is also possible to find a "pick off point" somewhere near the output of the memory voltage supply circuitry but measuring it at the slot would be, in theory, more accurate. If you look in the voltage mods section of the XS forums you can probally find where someone has found a susposed 'memory voltage test point'.

I will add the ideal method is to use, determined by stabilty testing, as little extra voltage as needed to acheive your OCing goals and since you cannot change the values the bios settings use, a nice long testing session with memtest86+ would be enlightening and a finger "probe" to check memory temp is also a good test method.

default voltage for ddr2 is 1.8v. in their menu system it's formatted as +.05, +.10 or something like that, right?

so, if it's +.10v, that would mean you're setting it to 1.9v.

Bill-- thanks for the detailed responce and though i wasnt planning on going that in depth i just might have to.. Right now i have a gigabyte p35c ds3r board... and i have been reading about all sorts of voltage problems with this board... right now i have my cpu core set @ 1.42 and cpuz shows it @ 1.35... Ummm can you cay vdrop... Then i read that the v to the ram is high... So if you have it at +.1 like jester is saying... Its not 1.9 but rather closer to 2.0.. then if i go +.2 its closer to 2.18 -- almost 2.2... Im trying to figure out how --A. not to fry my ram.. and B. if there is another bios to put in that helps with this.. I heard that f10 and f11 versions are even worse... Looking forward to the new boards to come ou and just get a x38 or x48 and hopefully call it a day.. Dfi or maybe Abit might be my next move.. Not feeling the gigabyte love.. allready had to rma this board cause it had the restart loop problem...

Maybe I missed it, but you don't say what BIOS you're currently at.
It was only starting with the F5 version for the p35c that they replaced the OK/FAIL with the actual voltages on the PC Health screen. Now when set to +0.3V in BIOS, it reads anywhere from 2.1V to 2.28V depending on your system. Some slower RAM, the board will start at 1.8V, for most faster sticks the board will start at around 2.0V with +0.0V set in BIOS.

The BIOS reading should match Speedfan's Vcore2 very closely.

slideways666 said:

Bill-- thanks for the detailed responce and though i wasnt planning on going that in depth i just might have to.. Right now i have a gigabyte p35c ds3r board... and i have been reading about all sorts of voltage problems with this board... right now i have my cpu core set @ 1.42 and cpuz shows it @ 1.35... Ummm can you cay vdrop... Then i read that the v to the ram is high... So if you have it at +.1 like jester is saying... Its not 1.9 but rather closer to 2.0.. then if i go +.2 its closer to 2.18 -- almost 2.2... Im trying to figure out how --A. not to fry my ram.. and B. if there is another bios to put in that helps with this.. I heard that f10 and f11 versions are even worse... Looking forward to the new boards to come ou and just get a x38 or x48 and hopefully call it a day.. Dfi or maybe Abit might be my next move.. Not feeling the gigabyte love.. allready had to rma this board cause it had the restart loop problem...

Click to expand...

I too was horrified when I saw some of the posts you mentioned and what the actual measurement showed vs bios settings. I can only hope later bios versions corrected the issue but I have not seen a lot about it lately but personally, when I buy the next high dollar MB and shell out for DDR3, checking the memory voltage before I put it in the case is on my to-do list. I hesitate to mention it, only because it is not something I recommend but over at XS they have a good thread on voltage mods for your board that might have voltage measurement points that are easier to "hit" with a probe and a Google of "P35C volt mod" gets a ton, (bet you have done it already but mainly for other people that might see this thread')