Dram calculator for ryzen: what is it, what is it for and configure it?

Of the RAM, not only the size is important, but also its speed, and if you have a PC from the AMD platform, the DRAM Calculator for Ryzen program will be very useful. Today we tested this memory optimization program to see what is the extra performance that we get from our AMD Ryzen 3600X. We already anticipated that it really is worth using, so let's go there.

RAM is one of the main components of our PCs, so knowing how to configure it correctly and buy a good quit is essential to take advantage of our processor. We will also discuss the issue of memory chips and which are the best, since it will be important in order to get the most out of our purchase.

The importance of choosing a good RAM memory

Nowadays, it may seem that choosing a good RAM is a simple task. It will be so if we only think about the price and the capacity we want, but there is much more behind a good RAM memory module.

If you are an undemanding user or do not want to complicate your life, we agree that there are three the most important parameters of a RAM memory, the capacity we want, the version and speed and of course the price. All desktop computers use DDR4, and these are offered in speeds ranging from 2133 MHz the slowest and up to 5000 MHz the fastest, although the most popular are always 3600 MHz, then we will see why. In any case, any user should know that using Dual Channel will be essential in terms of performance, so you should do everything possible to buy a quit of two modules instead of one, for example, 2 × 8 GB or 2 × 16 GB.

Choose the best chip

But there will be few users who bother to look at the chip that carries their RAM memories, since the normal thing is to look at the brand of the same, and not the one that manufactured the electronic chips that are installed in them. Currently we have many memory manufacturers, among the most prominent and most prestigious are Samsung, G.Skill, Corsair, Crucial, Kinsgton or now T-Force, which is betting on our market. But there are not many chip manufacturers, which are basically reduced to three, Samsung, Micron Technology and SK Hynix.

Among them, perhaps the one that is considered the manufacturer of the best chips is Samsung, not for nothing most gaming laptops using Samsung modules on their motherboard. Its chips are the ones that offer better stability and performance in overclocking situations at high frequencies. In addition, it is a manufacturer with incredible production capacity and advanced facilities where it also manufactures microprocessors and graphics RAM chips. In any case, having one of these three manufacturers on our chips is a guarantee of quality.

In addition to the chip brand, we must also look at the type of encapsulation or Die that they propose. We have types A-die, B-die, C-die, D-die and M-die. The difference is simple, they have to do with the density of chips per RAM memory module. The most acclaimed and used by gamers were the B-die type, which offer very good stability and performance. But Samsung has already reported that it would stop manufacturing these types of chips to focus on others with higher density, such as A-die and M-die, in order to have modules with greater storage capacity.

In any case, if you have Samsung chip and B-die memories, you can consider yourself lucky, as they are considered the best of their kind.

Know what chip I have with Thaiphoon Burner

All this is very good if we know how to look at the chip that we have, and we will do it through the Thaiphoon Burner program, which among other things will get a complete report of the characteristics of our RAM memory.

We can download and use it for free from its official page. In addition, it does not need installation, and it is only a matter of double clicking on the executable "Thaiphoon" to start it.

Depending on the type of memory, it will give us more or less results. In these examples we have memories with chips from the three manufacturers, leaving first the G.Skill Trident Z Royal Gold 3600 MHz with a Samsung B-die chip. Then we have the new G.Skill Trident Z Neo RGB with Hynix D-die chip, and finally an older Ripjaws model with Micron B-die chip.

Precisely these are the two parameters that interest us most in the face of using DRAM Calculator for Ryzen, although latencies, the number of modules we have and what their maximum speed is will also be important.

The influence of RAM on AMD Ryzen

And if you are users of AMD (for something you are in this article), you should know that these CPUs are especially sensitive to the frequencies of RAM memory and its chips, especially the 1st generation Ryzen, and to a lesser extent those of 2nd and 3rd generation. Surely many are aware of the incredible difficulty in finding suitable modules for the Ryzen 1000, something that fortunately was rectified in the 2nd generation and to a greater extent with the new Ryzen 3000.

The latter have introduced notable improvements to their internal Infinity Fabric bus, which is in charge of transporting data from RAM to the CPU. An important aspect of using the DRAM Calculator that we should at least know is that this bus is now capable of operating in a 1: 1 ratio with RAM memories up to 3733 MHz nominal frequency.

This means that with an effective frequency memory (that of its specifications) of 3733 MHz or less, Infinity Fabric will operate at the speed of the bus, that is, half the effective frequency that in the case of about 3600 MHz, would be at 1800 MHz. But passing the 3733 MHz, the bus will be in 1: 2 ratio, reducing its frequency by half and thereby putting more latency in the communication. Precisely for this reason, AMD always recommends using 3600 MHz memory to squeeze that 1: 1 out of your bus. However, the Ryzen 3000 supports memories of up to 5100 MHz.

Using DRAM Calculator for Ryzen in our RAM

DRAM Calculator is a free tool created by TechPowerUp that is only available for AMD Ryzen with the aim of optimizing the configuration of the RAM that we have installed to improve the performance of our AMD PC. We can obtain it without major problems from its official website and we do not even need to install it since it is executable. Mind you, keep in mind that it is only available for AMD Ryzen, so it will not work for Intel, or at least that's the idea.

Why only for Ryzen? Well precisely because of the high dependence of its Infinity Fabric bus with the speeds of the memories. Intel processors in this sense are one step ahead, admitting practically any RAM module and making them work perfectly under any circumstance due to the configuration of their internal bus and not using chiplet-based architecture.

Pre-test configuration

When running the program this is what we will find, a fairly dense interface with a large number of boxes still missing results. We must focus on the first column, which will be where we enter the parameters of our RAM memory.

• Processor: we will place the Ryzen generation that we have installed. It also supports Threadripper processors. Memory Type: here we will place the type of chip, B-die, D-die or whatever, previously seen in Thaiphoon. Profile Version: we will keep it by default in V1 Memory Rank: likewise the generic parameter will be the value 1 Frequency: we will select the effective frequency at which our RAM memory works, in our case it will be 3600 MHz. BCLK: this will be the clock base of our motherboard or multiplier, which will be 100 in current processors. DIMM Modules: we will select the amount of memory modules that we have installed on the Motherboard motherboard: finally we must choose the chipset of our AMD motherboard, which will be the X470, X470, B450 or X399 in the case of the Threadripper.

In any case, the program should correctly detect all these parameters directly from our RAM memory, although it is always important to verify that everything is correct with the other program.

Optimization parameters

When everything is correct, then we will look at the four buttons that we have at the bottom of DRAM Calculator. The first of them "R-XMP" is to read the data that the XMP profile, in this case DOCP by AMD, which are currently working on our PC.

We are interested in the next three, well, rather, the next two. These are to calculate the parameters that we must enter in the section of RAM in our BIOS to obtain the supposed best possible performance from them. Of course the colors and the nomenclature come to refer to the degree of demand that we want. We always recommend using the “Calculate SAFE” option since Fast and Extreme are parameters that put the integrity of RAM memory to the limit, while with Safe we ​​can keep them in daily use of our equipment without stability problems.

The program has the data perfectly divided according to its use, the most important ones being those of the two central columns that refer to the latencies and the parameters related to the operations of the memories. In the right area, we also find the parameters related to the voltage of the RAMs, whose values ​​are important for their stability. The rest of them will be found in the section on latencies, in a huge list that we will see below in the BIOS.

In any case, we recommend placing them all in their corresponding places, especially those previously mentioned.

Enter parameters in BIOS

After obtaining these results, it is time to enter the data in the corresponding sections of the BIOS. In the example we have used an Asus BIOS, so let's see what to do.

The first and main thing will be to disable the automatic profile DOCP function in the Extreme Tweaker or Tweaker section of your BIOS. In this case we will use the dreaded option "Manual" to allow us to enter the parameters one by one in the corresponding boxes.

As you can see, we have the names that we have seen previously in the program, for example, BCLK, DRAM Voltage, VDDSOC, etc. We only have to limit ourselves to filling in the parameters that coincide on behalf of those shown in the program. The rest, we will leave them as they are, surely in "car".

Take special care to input the voltages correctly, and the main CL latencies, (DRAM CAS #, Trcdrd, Trcdwr, DRAM RAS # PRE and DRAM RAS # ACT), as too aggressive (low) values ​​could burn the modules. The memories do not support as much game as the processors, in any case the BIOS should protect us against inconsistencies that put their integrity at risk.

Is DRAM Calculator really worth it?

In another article we have carried out a series of tests with the scaling of the frequency of the RAM memory from 2133 MHz to 3600 MHz. Likewise, we have used DRAM Calculator to check if there really are better between a generic profile at 3600 MHz and the personalized profile that DRAM Calculator gives us.

Here we summarize precisely those results with 16 GB using the G.Skill Trident Z Royal Gold in Dual Channel and an AMD Ryzen 5 3600X processor installed on an Asus Crosshair VIII Hero X570 motherboard. We have carried out synthetic tests and also tests in different games.

As for games, the greatest influence is seen in Full HD resolution, since it is where the CPU has the most influence. And these results reflect an improvement of 1 FPS, it will seem little, but keep in mind that the frequency is exactly the same, and we have only changed latencies and voltages. It is already a logo to have obtained an extra FPS.

Regarding the synthetic tests, we also see improvements in regards to the physical score, which is handled by RAM and CPU, with slight increases. And we can say the same the CPU rendering tests, being slightly better in our custom configuration.

And where it is most noticeable, it is in the pure performance of RAM memory using the AIDA64 benchmark. We see notable improvements in reading with more than 2000 MB / s, but also a slight increase in latency. Due to the peculiarities of the Infinity Fabric bus in this Ryzen with a single CCD, we have relatively low writes and they do not improve with the DRAM Calculator configuration.

Conclusion on DRAM Calculator

Anything that allows us to upload FPS on our PC if we are gamers is welcome, and we believe that DRAM Calculator is an excellent option to optimize the AMD platform whatever version we have. We see noticeable improvements in the same frequency of RAM which is already an achievement.

And if we have Samsung chip memories and good cooling, then we could take the step to the program's "FAST" profile, because these improvements will surely be at least 2 or 3 FPS in Full HD.

Now we leave you with other tutorials that may be interesting:

What RAM do you have installed? Did you know this program? Tell us if you have obtained any improvement with your personalized profile.