I have AMD Expo ram in my Intel Motherboard and want to upgrade, what should I get?

AGW

I have 32gb of AMD Expo Ram in my MSI Z790 Carbon Wifi motherboard with an Intel Core i7 13700K

I have G.skill Trident Neo RGB 6000mhz Ram in my PC, which has AMD Expo.

I wanted to ask, would it be better for me to get another kit of the ram I have right now, or get the same ram but with IntelXMP instead?

Thanks

PowerSpec_MikeW

@AGW

My personal opinion on it. I'm not concerned about whether it says EXPO or XMP. They're different ways of doing the same thing. Providing the board with a voltage, frequency and primary timing set. There's a lot the board has to figure out with secondary, tertiary timings, impedance values, ect. The bigger factor is looking the RAM and verifying the parts on the RAM haven't changed. This can be checked by the product code on GSkill.

Example: 0R48AH8821A

Note: This is my interpretation based on online information and checking sticks with other tools. This has not been verified.

Highlighted characters are what I'm looking at. We'll go in order.

A: Ampec PMIC. This is new to DDR5. Ideally PMIC should negotiate voltage individually per stick and this should be the least likely problem if it's different.

8: Density. 8 is 8GB, S is 16GB. 8GB on a 16GB stick means it's double sided.

2: Hynix. 1 is Samsung, 3 is Micron. IC manufacturer.

A: Die revision. Hynix A-Die.

If the Die/Rev or density do not match it's extremely likely you're going to fail to POST.

Now lets discuss doubling the ram and a few acronyms.

1DPC - 1 DIMM per channel.

2DPC - 2 DIMM per channel.

Just for the basics. 2DPC is harder on the memory controller than 1DPC. DS is more difficult to push than SS. 2DPC on DDR5 either Intel or AMD is difficult. Default behavior even on a JEDEC profile is to downclock to account for it. Intel always provides excellent documentation in their white sheets. You can read section 5 on memory for your CPU here: https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/content-details/743844/13th-generation-intel-core-and-intel-core-14th-generation-processors-datasheet-volume-1-of-2.html

This is the table for your CPU and you would see on the right column based on the configuration and the ranks how the memory would clock down automatically, as low as 3600 from a 4800 JEDEC profile. You can enable XMP, though keep in mind results will vary. It's going to be difficult to hit 2DPC at 6000 without manual adjustment.

Check your board and see what the manufacturer has tested: https://www.msi.com/Motherboard/MPG-Z790-CARBON-WIFI/support#mem

They don't seem to indicate they've tested much of the higher end RAM in 2DPC configurations, so the chances are slim. I recently tested for a customer trying to run the MSI MPG Z790 Edge WIFI with our factor 5600 C36 at 2DPC. Would not POST on XMP. JEDEC would load at 4000. I was able to get it up to 5000 on VCCSA at 1.25V. I didn't spend a lot of time on it, but 5000 is where I seemed to hit a major slow down in progress.

To summarize. If you want 64GB at 6000, I'd replace the kit with a 2x32GB, so you can do your 64GB 1DPC. Trying to 4x16GB on DDR5 right now, with some exceptions, I would expect to have to manually overclock the RAM.

PowerSpec_MikeW

@AGW

Are you having an issue or unable to load the XMP profile in the BIOS? If it works and it's stable, keep it.

AGW

@PowerSpec_MikeW I am not having any problem with ram as of right now, but I want to upgrade to 64gb from 32gb, the kit I have right now uses AMD Expo, but I use an intel CPU, I wanted to know if I should get the same exact kit I have now, which has AMD Expo or buy the intel XMP version and use them both, Thanks

AGW

Thank you! I will definitely be doing that