The Official OC (OverClocking) Thread!

abuzar1,

I don't have a digital camera available at the moment, but with the GA-965P-DS3 and it's square heatsink the Freezer 7 Pro overhangs the heatsink just a tiny bit so you have to install it so it's outside the cooler so you have to install it 1/4" off center, away from the CPU. That's why you can only use the 2 holes in the fan nearest the CPU.

On the P-35 the CPU socket and the NB are about 1/2" further apart, so no problem. If you look at the picture above you will see 2 fatter grooves in the center part of the heatsink which the holes of the 20x20x40mm fan line up with almost perfectly with the 2 grooves and you can center it on the heatsink without the Freezer 7 Pro interfering. The cooler misses the fan by about 1/8"! Without the fan installed on the 965P the heat comes up right under the edge of the cooler making both the CPU and the NB run hotter, as well as that whole area of the MB because of heat migration. Making the fan blow into the heatsink allows the hot air to be carried away by the case airflow without heating anything up or interfering with the cooler's airflow.

Clockin On at the Speed of Light,
theone :>)

 

Hello everyone again. Well im going to go with the intel 6850 cpu.
Now im confused once again on motherboard choices. I was going to go with the EVGA 680i but i cant because it doesnt support 1066 ram. Im going with pc8500 ram as being the prices arent so bad now.Corsair DHX XMS2 Dominator Dual Channel 2048MB PC8500 DDR2 1066Mhz Memory with Dominator Airflow Fan (2 x 1024MB) for only $190 USD. Which i think is good. So anyways, Now there are new advances in motherboards like p35 or x38 and so forth. So im here for your input on quality, performance, and
price. please do tell and be honest.My next question will be a decent video card. Im not a big gamer but should i choose to do a little gaming
i would like something that can hold its own. I mostly do alot of video related work as well as 3d graphics and clips. I use lightwave alot and that is an intense program. By the way the cpu cooler im using is the giant thermalright 120 extreme w/ 120mm fan. My power supply is the CORSAIR CMPSU-620HX ATX12V v2.2 and EPS12V 2.91 620W Power Supply. As for my case well im thinking about the thermaltake armor case aluminum. Because i will be loading it with as many sata hd's as the motherboard you recommend supports. ANy other questions feel free to ask. Please feel free to give your opinions on my set-up.

Once again thank you for your input....

 

Are you willing to spend a bit? If you are then go with one of the X38 chipsets since they support Peryn. Otherwise a Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3R will do fine.

 

chop2113,

Based on a upper end of quality & performance w/ larger budget, then let me suggest what I have and where I'm now moving to quickly, since it sonunds like we have and require the same needs.

CPU: great pick for today till Penryns offer better lineups and @ better prices.

Motherboard; Stay w/ X38 and aim for DDR3 if possible aince performance is great on these chipsets and $$$ are coming down as we speak, but DDR2 is fine for another year on this if you get the best top notch DDR2 good to 1200/mhz +. 12 drives (SATA/PATA, excluding USB/IEEE 1394 A/B). For my 1st pick today, I look to the ASUS P5E3-WS Pro Workstaion Series from ASUS or the non "3" version as DDR2 only, Model P5E-WS Pro. Offering 10 SATA (4 E-SATA) and 2 PATA (EIDE). At just under $500.00 it't not as like some don't spend more then this on a single VGA just to play a game. So folks like me, it's not all that expensive as for what you get. You get a mobo state of the art todaay and for a good solid year to come + till new Intel onboard memory controllers come out requiring new chipset (maybe within 2 years).

Case; I still believe in the simple, yet very effective, 1 way in, 1 way out pissitive air flow ventalization. Extra vents in side or fans at off speeds and flow plus other venting leaks (ie, PIC slots and such) leave for slight reduction in good possative case aenalition plus quietness due to reduced wind noise csuaed by turbulance created by too man or impropper balanced fan control. I also sugest heavy metal steel to other alloys as they absorb noise and vibration so much better.

For good mobo on DDR2 at a lower Price, look to the P5E Deluxe @ around $230.00 USD with almost the same features as the elaborate MAXIMUS FORMULA of the ROG (Republic Of Gamers) series.

Good luck and keep us posted.

Clock On!

 

Propper Case Ventilation

Sometimes, just the simplest yet effective set up can do wonders.

For everyday units, I stick to the one "IN" two "OUT" (using PSU as an OUT vent) ventilation method for best of both quietness and coolinf efficiantcy. This method makes the propperly closed and sealed case an important part of the ventilation ststem cause it forces air to flow where it's supposed to and not build up drag, turbulance and drop off in preasure leaking out other paths on the way to the primary exhalst duct/fan. This means closing off all open PCI slot plates and side vents or open bay slots in fron.

Side venting is OK if used correctly but we dont really use coolers that can benifit this type of outside air ducted intake to CPU like the older Zalman flowers or any stock cooler. For that to work, you would need to duct cool air from out of case (duct in side door) abd direct to CPU cooler center (only if it vents in toward the motherboard) so air is forced down and into around mosfets and chipset + RAM to aid as partof the cooling system. Many components can be ported/ducted to the case side door to lower tepms but if not ducted and only opened up as a hole drops air flow to overall system.

Anybody with side vents can try their own test at home to se if it helps your configuration. Cause, while you mat drop the CPU cooler teom by 1c, the mobo and NB/SB and VGA can rise by as much as 3c, hard drives too. And if this is the case for your CPU cooler, then it is a good indication thet the rear exhalst fans are not ballanced propperly to keep up with preasure created by CPU cooler and fill in w/ cool air intake from case fan in front.

The other god option is to just go with a large HTPC (desktop style) and "stove pipe" vent all major components. This is simplest as you just cut holes and duct w/ tubes over the areas of needed cooling ie; NB, mosfets, VGS, SB, and of corse CPU. This works with no fans cause warm heated air in the case at base of your stove pipe creates a natural convection as heat rises under preasure to top (cooled room temp) of opening. As it continues to work fresh air will be sucked in from any means f openings at bottom surroundings of case to keep the convection moving. Adding exhalst fans to the tube openings can only boost this action for added performance.

So as you can see, there are so many options and room for creativity as well. PM me as I am hapey to share more results for various configurations with popular coolers.

Keep On Clockin'!

 

It seems russ seems a big temp drops because of the side vents. Also I think VGA side vents come in handy when the cool air reaches your GFX card. I haven't really done any tests, so I'm just trying to imagine things and hoping I'm right lol.

 

NuckNFuts,

No disrespect intended, but most folks around here can't afford $375 motherboards and $500 memory. Even if I could afford it I wouldn't spend that much money for those items. I didn't spend it when I was making 100G+ a year and components used to cost more then than they do today. Even DocTY has slowed down on high dollar stuff and he makes a better living than a lot of us do! It's just not worth spending the big bucks just to be the first to have something! We have guys here who go to College, High School, raising families, etc! What they come here for is for someone to help them understand the in's and outs of overclocking and how to take that P4, Pentium D, 64x2 and C2Ds and make them perform better.

To me the whole point of overclocking is to make something from lesser components. Anyone can buy the absolute best, put it together and have a very fast machine. Granted it's much easier, but where's the challenge in that or for that matter, the need? When the Penryns come, things will be even better and faster but the price is going to be high for a while.

How fast is fast? Am I supposed to feel bad because your 6750s are faster than mine? Believe me, I don't! I'm happy for you that you reached 4.0GHz, but I wouldn't spend the same money you did to get there. I'm well satisfied with what I have and I'm ready for the Penryns!

It would be a wonderful world if there were specifications that all case manufacturers adhered to, but that's not even close to the case (no pun intended)! Let's face it! The majority of cases out there today don't cool worth a flip when you overclock, even some of the most expensive ones. It seems to me that when you can cure a heat issue just by the simple addition of a fan in the right place and can control the channeling of the air through the components in the case by increasing or decreasing the airflow of that fan to alter the path the air takes through those components, then you've found a good thing! I work with airflow every day, as I design miniature air turbines for Dental drills that operate at speeds upwards of 450,000 rpm, powered by a 28-35 cfm, 80 psi air supply. You have to be able to get that air in and out efficiently or the handpiece won't run fast enough or have enough torque to drill the teeth. I just apply what I learn in my work and study the airflow characteristics as applied to the inside of a computer case. I also live in one of the hottest parts of the country from May thru September with temps in the 110F and up range (it's been as high as 121F this year alone) My Cooler Master Cavalier case is a good one but better airflow through it makes it better yet. It was easy and cheap to do and I have a case that cools better than many cases costing 3 or 4 times or more! The $62 I paid for mine turned out to be quite a bargain. All it took was some studying on my part to see where the air flowing through the case wasn't good enough, and then figure out a way to make it better. I've consistently had some of the lowest temps in this and other forums over the last 2 years and didn't have to spend a ton of money to do it! I don't like water cooling as water and electronics just don't mix. All it takes is one tiny little leak and your wallet loses weight, possibly big time! No thank you!

I get the distinct feeling that water cooling is on the way out anyway as the new 45nm chips from Intel are so thermally efficient, use so little power and run so cool that you can easily overclock them on air alone with no problems or heat issues. Some of them draw as little as 8 watts at idle! I think the main problem for the new chips will be electro-migration. They just don't get hot enough for the heat to be an issue!

Respectfully Yours,
theone :>)

 

Theonejrs,

This is so unlikely, and if anything is not enough anymore. Let's face it. We're overclockers and too much is never enough. We get offered 3.2G, we want and shhot for 4G. Penryn is looking like it can do 4G from the get go so we'll shoot for 5G now.

So as for cooling, water isn't enough for those in search of 4.5 - 5GHz. Nitro is so expensive and dangerous so we'll likey see a move to Freon based A/C cooling for the desktop sometime soon. I used to do Home and Automotive A/C and can tell you the many benifits of a thermalstaticaly controlled system for PC Overclockers. Not as cold as Nitrogen, but many times safer and in reach of the average Joe's like us. Cause with overclocking , there will always be a need and desire to hit those closer to sub zero temps.

As for the above responce, I was only mentioning that as it was asked fro from a member. So just to clear it up a ad for others. I was suggesting it in comparison to one who would spend $600.00 on a video card or 2x at $350.00+ easy to go SLI, $230+ decent overclockable CPU to play the latest games, yet spend only minimal on mobo and sound. So it is not too far fetched to go for a $500 mobo + $150.00 VGA , + same CPU to get a good strong workhorse.

I so do believe in overclocking on a budget. It's fun, I do it for the challange myself. I do however get the best mobo/chipset I can to keep it stable as this is the backbone that all will ride on. If I could build my own mobo based soley on the NB/SB/DDR controller with abliity to custom BIOS to tweak as need be, then by all means, I'd go for that alone and leave out the "bling bling".

 

I didn't mean to make it sound that far fetched and out of reach. The reality is it is within reach of some of the members here if they wanted to. I read so many post and sigs that show you guys are using $350.00 and above sets of SLI graphics on nominal to lesser priced motherboards.

I simply gave a user an answer I same if not less price option aimed more at great overclocking with good storage and not so focused on gaming initially (yet later, would be awsome). An ASUS P5E Deluxe on DDR2 is fairly priced as low as $230.00 and a nice mid quality HDMI PCI-E VGA by MSI can run as good as $150.00, overclockible DDR2 PC2-8500 2x 1 GB as low as $129.00. Still at only $510.00 Less then most gamers will drop for a single top end PCI-E nVidia or ATI. Put any budget CPU of your choise and you can't go wrong.

Let's take a pole. What is your guy's average spending on top end PCI-E in either single high end or SLI dual medium or high end?

ie; set of two EVGA 768-P2-N831-AR GeForce 8800GTX Superclocked 768MB 384-bit GDDR3 PCI Express $550.00 each ($1,100.00 for SLI).

Just A Though!

 

NuckNFuts,

As I said, I made that statement based on some of the test's I've read from Tom's Hardware and a couple of others. Heat was not an issue at all. Figuring a way to eliminate electro-migration is. The electronic pathways in a CPU are sort of like super miniature fire hoses. Once a leak starts, there's no way to stop it as it will erode it's way along. It's not a matter of lowering the OC and everything will be all right. Once Electro-migration starts, there's nothing that can be done to fix it. The CPU is finished! Liquid Nitrogen won't prevent it. The only indication of a problem will be when it fails. Now at least we have heat as an indicator when we've gone too far. These new chips don't give you that. There is no warning and they can handle incredible overclocks with nothing to indicate when you've gone too far. You won't know it's broke till it's too late, you'll know only when it won't work anymore! I know I'm going to wait. I have a fast computer now and I'll let other people destroy enough of theirs until a knowledge base is built so us poor people don't have to risk their expensive CPUs. After a few months we should have a far better idea of just how much they can be overclocked and whether they'll last. Even the XX50s run cooler! Mine draws only 18 Watts at a stock idle speed. The E4300 draws way more than that. The Quad Core Penryn draws 3.78 Watts at idle.

I agree with "We're Overclockers"! Like I said, some people would overclock the oven if they could get their Pizza faster! LOL!!

I trust you meant Liquid Nitrogen? Nitro would indeed make a fast computer! LOL! At least till it landed! ROFL!! The problem now with existing Refrigerant based coolers, is condensation and a way to remove it, and they're still fairly expensive and very bulky. Also the available refrigerants today are woefully lacking in cooling power compared to the old R-12 systems although I did find a way to convert my AC in my old Fiero GT to the new stuff. I had to put a new compressor in and since it was made for the conversion to begin with, it worked real well. It even cooled well at idle speeds.


Best Regards,
Russ :>)

 

I have a lot of it set up for test but need more time to troubleshoot in the area of electronics and moisture control.

For right now, I'm keeping the moisture side of the unit ouside of the case and using a ducted system to force filtered dehydrated air into case. This takes care of passive cooled heat pipe sinks in the case on mobo but CPU water block is still filled with water and passed through a coiled copper water chiller tank wich is R-12 cooled from same A/C system to keep wate bath at a steady temp to control dew point level.

I wont go into too much detail as it's not for the average Joe, but I welcome any to PM me with qestions or comments on any of the above related to my fully automatic thermalstatic controlled PC A/C system

 

NuckNFuts,

I guess a lot would depend on where you live. That would work very well here, as it's almost always dry. Don't think it would work too well in some place like Florida, because of the dew point!

I remember some years ago seeing a filter in a restaurant that went into the refrigerator air vent that removed moisture to make the food last longer and stay fresher. The active material was some sort of crushed rock. Maybe something like that would be the ticket.

Clockin On at the Speed of Light,
theone :>)

 

Interestingly enough, that's exacyly what I use. for both the fluid lines and the duct output from evaporator core. It is a dehydrator recieving tank for fluid the absorbs the water in the lines till it collects in the absorbing sack at bottom of a tang w/ a sight glass so it can be drained from time to time. It's a felt cloth sack w/ a charcole type stone in it to filter both moisture ans smells as well. Same is for the forced air duct into case. but to helf moisture control down closer to dew point, fresh slighted air from room is blended into blower duct rather then have to keep moving fluid suction throttling uop and down all day long. Moisture collected from duct inside will colect in a run off drip pan just like in a home frige.

I'm in San Francisco, So Bay Area; Sillicon Valley, Santa Clara, Calif. and it is ralitively dry here and not much more then 115f sun load on skylight glass.

 

Well guys im going to go for the GIGABYTE GA-P35C-DS3R at $150 USD with all the goodies i need its perfect. As far as for the more expensive boards well my idea of overclocking is to be able to go with midrange products (where possible) and push them to perform as good as the high performance products. i think the giga board does just that. Also have you guys seen the new Thermalright Ultra - 90 for $30 USD. It performs as good if noe better than the bigger cpu heatsinks. definatly worth a look at. Just my 2 cents.Well thanks for your input. As soon as i start putting my rig together i will be here alot. Since this will be my first time overclocking. Im doing the research at the moment till the judgement time comes.

My Parts List so far goes

Cpu intel 6850
motherboard GA-P35C-DS3R
RAM Corsair 1066 2gb w/ Dominator air flow fan
Cpu Heatsink thermalright 120 extreme w/ 120mm fan
1 WD Raptor 150gb for Programs
Thermaltake Armor case
Corsair 620 watt power supply
Lite on Write All dvd burner

Need help choosing a good video card thats cheap and support dual monitors as thats the set up i use. ANy input is greatly appreciated.

Well i think im done picking your brains for now.Wish i had something to give back but im new in this arena. Itll be a while before i can talk some smack lol .

Well thanks again guys....

 

My 1.8Ghz E4300 was an absolute doddle to get to 3.15Ghz using that exact board, so with an E6850 you should do well. It's worth mentioning I use the same heatsink but my memory isn't quite as good, so you should achieve a ridiculous overclock. You've also chosen a very good power supply, and a case with a good amount of airflow. As for the graphics card it depends on how much you game. If you want to play Crysis you really want to get as powerful a card as you can, but any demanding game can be tamed simply by carefully working the detail levels. You can get an increased frame rate by as much as 20 times simply changing the dynamic lighting settings. If you're not a gamer, then of course all you need is a basic card that can use Dual link DVI, like an X1600 pro.

 

chop2113,

I use an XFX 7600GT in almost the same setup. It has 2 digital outputs for a dual monitor setup. I don't play a lot of games a lot but I do play Quake, Quake Arena and Delta Force Extreme. Here's my 3DMark 03 scores!



I've been using this now for about 9 months, first on my GA-965P-DS3/E4300 and my current GA-P35-DS3R/E6750. I'm planning on getting 2GB of the Crucial Ballistix Tracer 1066 memory. I'm at 3.528MHz with my E6750 and can't get it stable above that. I think my present 800MHz memory speed is holding me back at the moment.

You made some good choices in selecting your components. It should be a fine machine.

abuzar1,

Sorry I missed your post. JUst so you know, the GA-P35-DS3R supports the Penryn as well!

Clockin On at the Speed of Light,
theone :>)

 

What's your 3dmark06?

 

sammorris,

I don't normally use it as I don't really have enough video card for a lot of it's content. But then again, I'm not a heavy duty gamer. It's still a pretty good improvement over what it would do with the E4300! Say about 4000+ 3DMarks!

How's the new build doing? I'm thinking of going to 1066 memory with 2GB of crucial Ballistix Tracers. I think my memory is what's holding me back. Guess I'll find out! LOL!!

Clockin On at the Speed of Light,
Russ

 

Hmm, well, it'd just be an interesting comparison. No matter which 3dmark you use, the graphics card is the biggest part of it.
As for the new build it's going pretty well. I had to reinstall all my Steam games with the new OS but other than that the change was relatively swift. The overclock was an absolute breeze once I realised I had to set the memory multiplier.

 

Well i found it :

XFX PVT73AUDE3 GeForce 7600GT Extreme 256MB 128-bit GDDR3 AGP 4X/8X Video Card

Chipset Manufacturer: NVIDIA
Core clock: 580MHz
DirectX: DirectX 9
DVI: 2
Price $ 140.00

But for $20 dollars more there is this one as well

XFX PVT84JU1D4 GeForce 8600GT Fatal1ty 256MB 128-bit GDDR3 PCI Express x16 HDCP Ready SLI Supported Video Card

Chipset Manufacturer: NVIDIA
Core clock: 620MHz
DirectX: DirectX 10
DVI: 2

Price $160.00

Would this be a bit better? for 20 dollars more doesnt seem bad and it supports directx10.

Let me know. Im not a big gamer but should i choose to i want something that will holld its own..

Thanks in advance once again.