The Official OC (OverClocking) Thread!

i5s are supposed to be stupidly easy to OC. Because most of the stuff is integrated on-chip, the auto settings are much more reliable than on previous chips/boards. I would never trust any setting on my own board to auto. But with i5 it is designed to be used so I don't see why not.

Excellent results Sam glad to see you found the performance you were looking for. I doubt the low per-GPU PCI-e bandwidth is as harmful as you think either

 

nice setup will. i will give those numbers a go this weekend.

Sam, with this new board. UD3P 1.6rev i have everything in auto other than the MCH ive taken it up to 1.16v and im running at 3.83ghz with no problems at all.. with said bein in auto my vcor was a little high. it went up to 1.392v since i have gone and backed it down to 1.325v and is still fine. i beleive i can go lower on the vcore to keep this clock speed. i am like will stated going to go over 4.0ghz this weekend, well try anyways.lol

Will, i think your right it does have something to do with the newer bios mine is FD. just came out 11-23-09 id say it is even newer than yours.


i do know one thing. with this board everest doesnt recognize it. once i opend everest it had me do a log to send to everest to include this mobo. which i think is cause of the newer bios.

 

I just ran my Q9550 @ 4420MHz (520x8.5) . Requires huge amounts of voltage 1.45V vcore and 1.7V for the NB. But I got what i wanted (new SuperPI and 3DMark 06 records which can be found from here) and i didn't break anything .

 

Playing with the new Phenom II 965BE C3 step.

1.325V
20.17S - stock 3.4Ghz.
19.765s - 3.5Ghz (17.5 X 200)
19.282s - 3.6Ghz (18 x 200)
18.814s - 3.7Ghz (18.5 x 200)

1.35V
18.814s - 3.7Ghz (18.5 x 200) + .025V = 1.35V.
18.314s - 3.8Ghz (19 x 200)
17.815s - 3.9Ghz (19.5 x 200)

1.40V
17.534s - 4.0Ghz (20 X 200)

Was just curious as to numbers. Could care less about its current validity, if you know what I mean LOL! I realize that without either a voltage bump, or dry ice, it would not stay stable. Was merely curious. I have not even played with FSB, Nb frequency or ram yet. These scores are merely courtesy of the Multiplier.

This is an interesting read for those with Phenom II Cpu's. Apparently 4.6Ghz has been reached, while holding 1.4V!
http://www.techreaction.net/2009/05/28/phenom-ii-am3-overclocking-essentials/

 

Well...4Ghz crashed pretty quickly LOL! Prime 95 Bsod'd in about 2 seconds. I'll try 1.45V next, and see what happens. But from what I've read, voltage is not necessarily the issue.

 

Well, reasonable progress so far. If you can get 4Ghz, you're past the 'easy zone' for Phenom IIs. The voltage requirements do increase exponentially though, and not all CPUs are as good for volts as each other. Assuming you have a good cooler, don't be afraid to turn it up a little higher if you want test numbers.

 

Wow, I forgot how picky Ram can be LOL! I tried inputting its proper Timings, and well...it didn't like that. It almost sounded like it was stuck in a restart loop. I read that someone was able to set 8/8/8/24 so I tried that. So far it seems to like that. In fact it shaved nearly a tenth second off Super pi. I read on that prior link, that 3.8Ghz can fair better, if the northbridge is set properly. I think I'm gonna attempt that.
This is my cooler

 

Ouch, that's not a big cooler for the heat behemoth that is a Phenom II, I assume you're using the 125W version not the 140
How are the temps?

 

Indeed. Its a 125W TDP. This cooler used to cool the 940. The 940 is now cooled by the 965's stock cooler. It seems to be fairing well with it. For the whole hour that I ran it. I discovered that I wouldn't be using my so called new ssd, so I had to take its HDD for my primary system for the time being. The Cores and CPU are hovering around 48C idle(1400Rpm). When I run a stress test, the temperature rapidly climbs, causing the RPMs to rise. From what I noticed, the CPU temperature stopped climbing at about 58C. But it blue screened so...

 

2400Rpms, 52C. 10Second bsod. But at the rate it climbed and slowed, I can't see it getting hotter than 58-60C. But at those awful Rpms. So if I game GTA IV, I really should consider a different cooler. Eh, I hate this cooler anyway. Its a prick to install. Plus one of the corners is broken...

 

48C idle is a little worrying, since the Phenoms are meant to be quite efficient at idle
My main concern though is that to clock the CPU high you'll need to up the voltage to a point where thermal runaway will occur, the rate heat enters the cooler will exceed that which it can remove it - the temperature will never stop rising until you reach the emergency shutdown temperature.

 

I did shut off cool and quiet...

 

Still, my i5 750 upped to 1.36V does not retain its energy saving features, and yet it idles at 30ºC, considering the ambient tempertaure must be at least 24ºC, that's quite a landmark difference in Delta T. I'd recommend trying to get a tower cooler to progress further, especially if you say the mount is dodgy, which could potentially come off at some stage.

 

Everest stated during install, that more or less my motherboard was not recognized. So it could be misinterpreting the sensor.
You're right though. I want to run this CPU beyond the 940, so I should definitely consider a different cooler. Do you have any to recommend me? I don't like the way newegg categorized the cpu coolers. Am3 Coolers are not organized very good at all. I realize that probably most AM2/AM2+ coolers are the same.

 

Something like the Noctua NH-U12P, pretty sure that fits AM3.

 

Wow. Sure is spendy. And what does it mean by Backplate required?

I'm looking at this freak right now.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835233003

 

The Xigmatek I perceive as the 'poor man's' tower cooler, it's rather poorly made, it has a design flaw that weakens its cooling performance but it is of course cheaper. A middle man between standard size coolers like the freezer 7 and 'proper' tower coolers like the NH-U12.
It would probably suffice for your 965 overclocking efforts, but I don't like relying on cheap tacky things when it comes to such important jobs as CPU cooling.

 

You stand by the efficiency of the Noctua then eh. LOL! If you think it can cool very well at low rpms, then it must be worth that much.

Oh geeze! I think I'm looking at the backplate on the bottom of my motherboard Apparently AMD boards have a back-plate pre-installed.

 

The Noctua is every bit as good as the TRUE, which is an awesome cooler. It's just pricey because you get two fans with it as standard. Sadly, Thermalright stuff seems even more expensive in the US than it is here.
Suffice to say, the peak cooling performance of 120mm coolers is achieved at around 1500rpm fan speed. The fans provided with the NH-U12 are 1300rpm but high-output (9-blade), so are about the optimum performance. They're far from silent, but still much quieter than a Freezer 7 roaring at full speed, even when there's two of them running at once.
As for the AMD boards with a backplate, I suspect that most of them do except the cheap ones, and that said backplate must be present for the cooler to fit.

 

Most higher end AMD board will have a backplate built in.

If you don't want the Noctua there's always the Tuniq 120. Currently using 2 and I will swear by them ;P