Help optimizing BIOS settings for dram and cpu - some confusion....

[lfm]

So new daw computer up and running but is it running at optimal performance?

In BIOS I find this.

It says ram running at 2133 Mhz but installed ram is 3200 Mhz?
- forcing to 3200 it does not boot but go back to bios is fault mode
- I also tried setting up ram controller speed what ever setting was

What is this about?
- some safe mode or something?

All other computers, my daw from 2010 said 1366 or something that corresponded to memory specs.

And cpu says running at 4.5 GHz
- but base speed is said to be 2.1 GHz?
- cpu temp has not been above 30 degrees C yet

What do these numbers say?

There are more things to master than any time before it seems.

One setting I found at last was to set max power saving at power down, to let go of power to mouse or that laser was lit all the time.

Some important stuff in bios on my 2010 daw was to stop core parking to see that all 8 logical cores got even cpu load.

No clue how this 12th generation 12700F is best performance?
- 8 performance cores with hyperthreading 16 logical cores
- 4 efficient cores whatever that means

As I found windows 11 is supposed to make the most of these newer cpu's.
But gather bios settings also matter is my assumption.

BIOS says somewhere - Let ASUS decide setting etc.

Any tips welcome.
Thanks.

[Kr3eM]

Have you tried running your RAM with the XMP profile in BIOS?

[Kr3eM]

Would also help to spec what Motherboard and Ram you are running

[BertKoor]

Strategy:
1. Start with safe defaults
2. Run memtest86
3. Up the timing one tiny notch
Repeat.

Note there's not only a clock freq but also wait cycles (latency) to play with

[lfm]

Have you tried running your RAM with the XMP profile in BIOS?

Thanks, I tried that now - I tried XMP-1 as Asus call it.
Some more alternative in bios open to pick various speeds.

But it refuses to boot, just end up in bios again.

There is also XMP-2 which fully takes info from RAM which values to load, so maybe I will try that too. XMP-1 was some defaults from RAM but did not quite get difference.

I missed to tell the obvious needed
- MB is Asus Z690-P D4 for DDR4 then
- Corsair Vengeance LPX 32 GB(2 x 16) 3200 Mhz DDR4
. audio interface RME Digiface USB 64 samples buffer
- Graphics card Asus GT 1030 with Nvidias driver 528

I experimented with all kinds of settings for cpu and when turning off everything turbo it says 2.1 GHz steadily.
- some step thing
- C-states
- turbo

I get hiddeous latency and these cpu settings helped a little bit.
- constant around 600 us
- if I start daw Sonar Artist it increase to 1000 us
- and there are spikes up to 1900 us with a minute interval or so, sometimes more

Tested with
- DPC Latency Checker, good for graph over time
- Latency Monitor Free good to see which drivers are involved

And it's NTOSKRNL and Nvidia Windows Kernel Mode v528 and they are close in timing, around 2ms.

To compare with my really slow AMD Athlon laptop, benchmark around 3000, which benchmark a tenth than new computer latency with same audio interface is around 1300us but does not increase when Sonar Artist is started.

Compared with my daw computer from 2010, with RME HDSP 9632 and latency around 150us and does not increase when Sonar Artist is started either. This cpu i7-860 benchmark around 5000.

New computer cpu benchmark around 30 000 and I don't get this, never did I see that coming.

Either it is Nvidia driver and maybe I should look for if Asus has their own?
- heard over the years that certain version is horrible in performance
- so people revert to older version and such

[lfm]

Strategy:
1. Start with safe defaults
2. Run memtest86
3. Up the timing one tiny notch
Repeat.

Note there's not only a clock freq but also wait cycles (latency) to play with

Thanks.
Will check this memtest86 out.

Just feels strange to have to do trial and error.
Now that all turbo is turned off and that does not vary so much I will look at all variations and maybe do as you said.

I have this Process Lasso application that has a view with each of the 20 cores and it jumps around like crazy, one second 19 cores parked, next 12 parked and so it goes on.

Tried to find a setting that stops core parking, but did not find any dispite turning off all turbo and looking around.

When doing the firmware update on MB it said
- come here often, kind of remark
- there might be bugs on MB, I mean

[Dark Fiber]

My 12700 was also running full speed when idle. I had to update the bios to the latest version and set some setting to "stock cooler" which set the PL1 to 65w. Then it ran 2.1 GHz when idle. When i buy a good aftermarket cooler in the future i'll adjust that bios setting to that profile.

Is your memory explicitly supported by your motherboard? You can check that on Asus website on the support section of the page of your specific board

[lfm]

Nifty tool this memtest86 and learned many things.
- the model code that came out CMK32GX4M2E3200C16 does not say anywhere on box even, even less on retailer
- so how are you to compare?

Closest listing on Asus was M2Z as part of model code above instead of M2E.
- what that means I have no clue

Anyway it said 2133 MT/s, max clock 1600(XMP), transfer DDR4-3200
On another page it said max speed 1067, transfer speed DDR4-2133 if that was related to Timings Max 15-15-15-36

But a readup on DDR transfer MT/s should be double of clock frequency, so 1600 and 3200 fits that.

So for every question answered a couple more arise.

If the letter Z or E mean in code a batch with slightly different timing on RAS/CAS or something?
- or what they called timing max 15-15-15-36

I believe my alternativ in bios setting XMP on was 16-16-16-38 or so.

So bios had to fall back into 2133 instead?

They had a couple of pages extra in bios for enthusiasts or what they called where you could set every little parameter it seemed to me. Seems like asking for trouble doing that.

Well, time to hit the sack.....and call it a day....

[lfm]

My 12700 was also running full speed when idle. I had to update the bios to the latest version and set some setting to "stock cooler" which set the PL1 to 65w. Then it ran 2.1 GHz when idle. When i buy a good aftermarket cooler in the future i'll adjust that bios setting to that profile.

Is your memory explicitly supported by your motherboard? You can check that on Asus website on the support section of the page of your specific board

Thanks, yes I check more thoroughly thanks to your suggestion, in my previous post above.

[Kr3eM]

For the latency spike and such, uninstall ASUS RGB software and other of their software bloat and see if that helps. Also, I assume you are running the latest version of BIOS?

For the core parking, try setting your system to 'high performance' in the power options... if that doesn't work I think Pictus posted a tool to configure power options in depth somewhere here. Also, it could be a energy saving setting in BIOS that overrides it, although it shouldn't...but who know.

[lfm]

I don't use the AURA or RGB, if that is the same thing?
- Aura is off in bios and nothing connected

I tried most I can think of in bios, and one setting I first turned on was save max power when it is turned off, but also affect how cores are allocated as I noticed. So changed that back.

When booting with network cable gone, it behaves much better, loads of stuff done towards internet while running this OS it seems. Sudden spikes 10-20 ms even, but not heard in audio anyway.

I've run now full project of 40 tracks or so and no crackles that I hear now, even having spikes in between and rather high idle 1000 us when daw is started. So on the verge of creating problems.

Looking at Latency Monitor which also identified various drivers and their timings it's always NT Kernel and Nvidia something that is longest durations.

I just want a workhorse that is reliable as my Windows 7 has been. And latency is 150 us on that 12 year old computer and don't know why new OS would be 500 using same measurement DPC Latency Checker and such a more powerful cpu.

So looking at GTX 1050 or similar graphics cards, that also has Studio Driver meant for video work. Current drivers are only Game Ready which I believe is bad for audio, optimized for gaming. This driver is 10 times longer duration together with NT Kernel than the rest running.

But could me more things in bios, will ask around....

[2DaT]

That's just NVIDIA driver doing NVIDIA things. Apparently there is some bug in the drivers that causes latency spikes when card is switching power states.

Set "Prefer maximum performance" under Power management mode in NVIDIA control panel.

Also setting "maximum performance" in windows helps too.

Setting these things will increase idle power draw substantially though. But that's not a big price to pay for a good low latency performance.

Hopefully they will fix the issue. They didn't have it like a year ago, it only started recently.

[lfm]

Thanks for input.
I will look at Nvidia panel.

Windows is set to high performance scheme.
Sonar is using Pro Audio settings and gives higher priority to threads.
- not all daws do that
- Cubase has option to set that, and they have their own Steinberg Power Scheme that is the same as high performance in windows usually when I checked those settings when using Cubase.

I ran old projects now and they sound fine. Starting computer and never had network power up helps a lot it seems. Lots of crap that check for updates and stuff. I remember even for Windows 7 daw I looked over everything installed what settings there are for updates.

Sonar performance monitor show nicely all cores moving at the bottom, 3-4%, with no load at all doing the biggest project I have.

Latency Monitor show decent values today, around 300-400 us, for some reason. DPC Latency Checker is like they measure differently, and constantly say 1500 us dpc which is really high - but nothing I can hear of pops or crackles. Way different than the other day. DLC measure 500 as computer is idle, but old Windows 7 it's around 150 us, so not sure what is going on there.

Turning off Max Power saving in bios helped too, but mouse and audio interface on usb still have power as shut down because of that. Or there is a setting in device manage usb stuff that I can look over, this allow to turn off or what is says. But I have switch to turn off all wall outlets anyway.

So ready to move computer over to studio desk and plug everything in there with more monitors and such.

[legendCNCD]

Wasnt DPC Latency checker incompatible with newer OS's? I'd say trust Latency Mon over it completely.

[lfm]

Wasnt DPC Latency checker incompatible with newer OS's? I'd say trust Latency Mon over it completely.

Thanks, I think you are right about that.
Developers thesycon.de does not list anymore either among their software.

So I look more into Latency Monitor instead. So far it seems ok and have not heard pops or crackles and it shows around 300 us and spikes 900 us or so.

Last thing I did was to see to that firewall cannot start with a registry entry. And still tries how calm and collected it can run and saw a comment among gamers with similar issue that they set PCI Express to v2 instead of v3 for graphics card. Have not found exactly that setting though in my Asus bios. Only something about setting x16 handled x8-x8 something, but noticed no improvement.

Still one always learn new things and no cow on the ice and stopping anything. Tomorrow I think it will replace old daw and see with all midi interfaces and everything connected.