The Official OC (OverClocking) Thread!

sammorris,

I've had my XFX 7600GT overclocked from 1525MHz to 1650, and the clock speed from 525MHz to 650, and it's been that way for about a year and a half or more without any problems. It idles in the mid 50s, and seems to work well. It will clock even higher, but the temps do start to climb! LOL!!

Russ

 

I've just put the Q9550 in to replace the Q9450 and there doesn't seem to be any real difference and I have to take the motherboard out each time so.... is the Q9650 gonna make a great deal of difference?
or should I just pass on it?

 

Thats because the Q9550 is only 166mhz faster and is still the C1 stepping. The Q9650 is 333mhz faster, and is the E0 stepping so will overclock much further.

 

Are you being extra cautious? I dont understand the need to take the mobo out the case just for a CPU swap. Whatever method you prefer is fine as long as the outcome is successful, it just seems like extra work.

 

pcrepair,
The 9650 is the current Quad sweet spot! LOL!! While $569 seems high, at first, it's the top rung of the low end. The next step up is almost twice the price. The Q9650 with E0 stepping is capable of doing about 95-98% of what the $1000 QX9650 can do, so from a price/performance view, the Q9650 is an incredible performer. I don't know as if we will ever see the E0 stepping on the 9450 or the 9550. Because of the released pricing on Core i7, I would doubt it! I believe that once Core i7 comes out, the 9650 will be the bottom of the Quad core lineup, at a greatly reduced price! That's what I'm hoping for, anyway!

You might send Sophocles a PM and ask him, as he has a Q9650, and his benchmarks have been stunning. he originally wanted the $324 Q9550, but he got tired of waiting for the EO stepping, and like I said, I don't think there will be one unless the Core i7 turns out to be a flop!

Best Regards,
Russ

 

TheOne

Are you still interested in what amd's are doing? I can remember you saying something about them.

the new 6500 x2 its clocked at 2.3 as standard but can clock as high as 3.3 - 3.4ghz on air, it has gotten rid of alot of the problems of the other duals. not sure if its a cut down phenom or the kuma core that never came to light.

http://en.expreview.com/2008/09/23/amds-best-dual-core-ever-athlon-6500-kuma-review.html/3

I will have one soon, not building a new system until all the new am3 phenoms are out so i can decide who to go with so for £70 it should be a bit of fun to keep me going )

 

ck5134,
The current hot ticket for the Phenoms is the 9850 Black Edition!
9850 2.5GHz 125w $169
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103249

This will do about 98% or more than what the 9950 does. AMD also just came out with a 125w 9950 Black Edition for only $15 more as well!
9950 2.66GHz 125w $184
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103291

With the prices going slowly down, I want to give the 9850 a shot. The 125 watt 9850 was about 98% as fast as the 140w 9950, for only $15 more I may re-think that, although it's a new CPU and doesn't have any track record. Until I see some results, I'll reserve judgement on which one to buy, although I still think the 9850 is the better buy. It's AMDs best selling Phenom, by a wide margin. It overclocks to about 3.2GHz compared to the 3.2GHz of the 9950. me? I'd save the $15! It's just not worth $15 to gain a whole tenth of a GHz to me! I don't even bother looking at the Phenom 3s as the performance of the Phenom 9850 is just so much better.

Best Regards,
Russ

 

Ah I was just pointing out that this is the fastest x2 amd that they are likely to produce on the am2/am2+ socket and a fair clocker, Im not going quad on am2+ leaving it until i see how the am3 quads perform before deciding to move to intel.

I will stick with this as it has a bit more oc room than the quads you have mentioned, my mate has the 9850BE it is good, but he wont let me O/C his system the killjoy.

rather than spend out on a current phenom and then an am3 one, i think this will suffice for what I need ) and at the price I cant fault it.

Got £1600 set aside so far for my build next year so cant wait to see what the tech battle is like between Amd/Intel Amd/Nvidia by the time I decide what to build.

 

I'm still an old fusspot lol. The 9850 is great, but it's only as fast as a Q6600. I had the worst Q6600 since B3, and yet I'm on par with a 3.3-3.4Ghz Phenom, and that's hard to pull off. Most people have better luck, and if you're no IBT user, this chip will do 3.42 fine, which is a 3.5-3.6Ghz Phenom, and we're looking at $189.99 versus $169.00, it's no bank breaker.

Just so we're clear, I have no objection you trying a Phenom out, and far from think that they're useless, but unless your results are far different from benchmarks, it'll be the Q6600 I recommend for cheap quad-core machines not the 9850 or 9950.

ck: Got any links to reviews of that 6500 chip? That does actually sound pretty impressive.


edit: Just found a review, interesting stuff. In benchmarks it's no faster, and in games it's 10% faster than the 5000+. Arithmetic calculations or MPEG encoding though and you get an extra 35% which is nice. Overclocked to 3.2Ghz let's say to be safe, that makes it the equivalent of a 3.6Ghz chip in benchmarks, a 3.9Ghz chip in games, and a 4.8Ghz for Mpeg encodes... :O - translated into (very) rough Intel numbers, you're looking at an E8400 for benches, an E8600 (stock) for gaming and a 4Ghz E8xxx for encoding, that's impressive, a chip that, for one purpose at least can almost match one of Wolfdale's finest when overclocked. Still not ideal for gaming if I'm honest, but it's certainly better than what I've seen from AMD before.

 

sam just been picking up little bits of info of the net nothing too concrete but they all mention 3.4 on air. the link i posted above has more info on it theres several pages on it.

heres a link to the deneb 45nm 3.2 phenom massive improvement by the looks of things but again i will wait. until i see more benchies and oc's on it. http://en.hardspell.com/doc/showcont.asp?news_id=3858&pageid=3149

but for around £65 - £70, I think the 6500 sounds like fun until I see what the 45nm phenoms can do in comparison to intel, and the price point they are released at.

 

What Russ said is true. The Q9450 and Q9550 are a different processors altogether than the Q9650. The Q9650 is cooler running and overclocks as well as the Dual core C2D chips do. I was able to hit 4 GHz without even trying and the only thing that got challenged on my system was my 1066 memory. If you have some good RAM and a decent after market cooler the very least that you will be able to achieve is 3.8 GHz and 3.9 GHz is more likely but with good RAM and cooling 3.9-4.0 GHz should be an expectation.

 

Sam,
The Phenom 9650 Black Edition runs out of gas at about 3.2GHz, The 9850 can be OC'd to about 3.2-3.3GHz and makes the 9950 redundant with it's 3.3GHz capability. That's why I said what I said to Sophocles. If you have to buy both a MB and a CPU, then even the 9650 is worth it because of the lower price. So far if I do wind up building one, as time is a factor for me, it will be the Phenom 9850 Black Edition 125w chip. By all reports it OC's to 3.2-3.3GHz with ease which will move it even higher up the ladder from the Q6600. At less than $300 for the chip and very good MB, I'm not losing anything, so why not! LOL!!

BTW! I still haven found out anything more as to why the 9650 can run with the Q6600 but be 7000 MIPS less in performance. Thanks for your answer to that btw! I now know why, now I want to know how they do it! LOL!! I know I saw 1 game on The Tech Report tests that the Q9600 just blew the 9650 away with a huge score difference, but everything else was either better or pretty close with the Phenom. The 9850 is a much better chip and has the new B4 cores and B3 stepping, so it should pretty much blow the Kentsfields away, and it's $100 cheaper than the Q6700!

You know me, I've always wanted to do a high end AMD build anyway, so I think it's pretty well worth the money. We'll see what happens to the pricing between now and the end of the year if Core i7 shows this year. I'll have those under 20 minute DVDRB/CCE times yet! LOL!!

Russ

 

is this because the Q9650 is E0 stepping or different CPU all together? i remember you saying if you could have gotten the Q9550 in E0 stepping you would have.. is that the only reason for going with the Q9650(hope that aint to personal) i am looking at the Q9550 E0 stepping microcenter has right now only 299.with it being E0 is it in the same park as teh Q9650? or should i wait till next year(jan-march area)time frame to get the Q9650 once prices come down???

 

I've never seen a Phenom anywhere near that fast. They pass stability tests at those speeds?

Rob: The E0 stepping is what gets you those juicy 4Ghz overclocks...

 

Rob

All of the EO stepping will offer the same overclocking benefits. I just haven't heard of anyone who has actually gotten their hands on a Q9950 EO stepping, but if you know where one is then grab it.

 

Yeh fastest I have seen a phenom is 3.4, the 3.8 - 3.9 is on water if not phase cooling

 

you mean Q9550??lol
dang i need 299..lol my microcenter has about 20 of them...

Q9550 E0 stock 2.83gb.. should easly hit 3.83ghz shouldnt it?say with 1.285v

 

Relax, I put the wrong figure in, 3.2-3.3GHz. I have recently seen some improvements on that to the figures you mentioned. For what I want to use it for, it should be a very good choice for little bucks.

Oh! You want links too? LOL!!
http://www.techspot.com/review/93-amd-phenom-9850-black-edition/
Not too bad and if the figures you quoted are good, then so much the better!

Russ

 

So where's the link and are they E0 stepping??? If so, up the voltage! Not the CPU, your Electro Shock Therapy! ROFLMSOAO

Hee-Hee,
Russ

 

Alas in order to keep the noise down I put a mars cooler on it and the darn thing only undoes from under the motherboard, but it is quite quiet

http://www.virtual-hideout.net/reviews/Coolermaster_Mars/index.shtml

this is it