CPU OC Wall?

[Everlong]

Dunno if you solved your problem John, but I found this when poking around on overclockers.com at the overclocked systems:

Note - If you select the 4GB Memory Upgrade option then the CPU overclock is reduced to 3.0GHz or less region to maintain stability with all four memory banks filled.

Maybe you have hit this problem?

 

[xguntherc]

Hmm.. I've never seen that. Although I've been told many times that I'd be more stable with 2GB of ram, back when I wasn't able to pass prime on 3.6 GHz. but now I can.

Plus the 3.0 or less region is the limit with 4GB is fairly inaccurate. I have a Quad Q6700 with 4GB of PC-8500 ddr2-1000 ram and I have hit a STABLE oc of 3.5 GHz and been about 4 hours stable at 3.66 GHz.

As that above statement has some truth to it, as 2GB is easier to achieve better OC results. All Overclocks are different in regards to CPU's. and there's many many factors that limit, or help the OC.

But good info either way. I've been wanting to try 2GB of better faster ram than my current 4GB of cheap DDR2-1000. right now it's clocked at 952 MHz with a 3.4 GHz CPU overclock. thats decent i guess.

 

[johngalt]

Dunno if you solved your problem John, but I found this when poking around on overclockers.com at the overclocked systems:

Note - If you select the 4GB Memory Upgrade option then the CPU overclock is reduced to 3.0GHz or less region to maintain stability with all four memory banks filled.

Maybe you have hit this problem?

Negative, as I use 2 x 2 GB not 4 x 1 GB, so only 2 of my banks (really, 2 slots, = 1 bank) is filled.

Hmm.. I've never seen that. Although I've been told many times that I'd be more stable with 2GB of ram, back when I wasn't able to pass prime on 3.6 GHz. but now I can.

Plus the 3.0 or less region is the limit with 4GB is fairly inaccurate. I have a Quad Q6700 with 4GB of PC-8500 ddr2-1000 ram and I have hit a STABLE oc of 3.5 GHz and been about 4 hours stable at 3.66 GHz.

As that above statement has some truth to it, as 2GB is easier to achieve better OC results. All Overclocks are different in regards to CPU's. and there's many many factors that limit, or help the OC.

But good info either way. I've been wanting to try 2GB of better faster ram than my current 4GB of cheap DDR2-1000. right now it's clocked at 952 MHz with a 3.4 GHz CPU overclock. thats decent i guess.

I have my DDR2-1000 running at 1000 (999.6 I think) and have my CPU OCd to 3213 MHz and all seems well.

I just ran RealTemp 2.6 for the first time in a long time - I had forgotten just how much of a difference there was between RT and CoreTemp. Real Temp shows all of my cores idling below 35C - whereas CoreTemp shows all above 35C, in fact 3 cores at 40+.

I am still new to the OC thing and I need to spend a lot more time with it all - but I have a feeling that I am at a wall, per se, and there is not a lot else I can do about it.

I suppose that it would be great to gather all the OCing info here both for CPUs and GPUs all in one spot so that people would not have to go looking at other sites. General recommendations, tools for OCing, tools for stability testing, etc.

 

[Everlong]

Would be a good idea to have a nice guide to overclocking. I've been trying to find one for overclocking Athlon x2's, but not been able to find a decent one.

 

[Fumz]

From DFI Street, since changed to DYI street, now merged with Overclockers Club, the original badass Athlon OC guide: [retro] The Original Diy-street Amd64 Overclocking Guide - OverclockersClub Forums

 

[johngalt]

OK, if I push my RAM above 1000 it BSODs fast. But, I now have the system running at around a higher FSB (1466, which makes for a dead even 1000 for the RAM when unlinked, and yet I enabled the Intel Speedstep and it is permanently stuck as a 6x multiplier. LOL

I thought Intel's more advanced Speedstep would bump it up when necessary- apparently it is not necessary even when running Prime64 on all 4 cores, utilizing 100% CPU across all 4 cores.

Sigh.

 

[Fumz]

lol, did you refresh cpuid when priming? It can get stuck and display the settings it initially detects.

 

[johngalt]

I refreshed and even killed it and restarted it.

 

[Fumz]

Wow, never heard of that before. Let me dig back through this thread to see if I can gleen anything useful... it may take me a while since I've got other stuff going on.


**edit**
Although, I think I recall you did the pencil mod? That may have killed your ability to use SpeedStep properly? Just an initial thought from what I recall...

 

[Fumz]

Recall that SpeedStep not only drops the multiplier, but also the voltage. In doing the vdroop pencil mod, you have essentially prevented vdroop from occuring. To what degree the pencil mod prevents vdroop is entirely a function of how much you pencil over the resistor. We can't say with any certainty where you're at because I have a feeling you did this without a multimeter?

Not only were there were dire warnings in big bold fonts plastered all over the page, but nobody who mods their boards like this really has any intention of also using SpeedStep... I think it would have been nice if they'd mentioned that somewhere on the page.

What effect the vdroop mod has on SpeedStep I don't know yet. I can't yet find anyone doing the mod who's also using SpeedStep.

 

[Fumz]

I still can't find anyone doing the vdroop mod who also uses SpeedStep, but when you re-enabled SpeedStep, did you also re-enable EIST and C1E? Give that a shot; if it still doesn't work, meh... I'm close to my wits end. I'll keep looking, but I have a feeling the pencil is what did you in.

 

[johngalt]

Wow, never heard of that before. Let me dig back through this thread to see if I can gleen anything useful... it may take me a while since I've got other stuff going on.


**edit**
Although, I think I recall you did the pencil mod? That may have killed your ability to use SpeedStep properly? Just an initial thought from what I recall...

Nope. I haven't done that yet because I am actually afraid because of the fact that my CPU takes such a high V to begin with....

Although, in Real Temp it shows the min V as 1.16, a lot lower and where it should be....I wonder if I took everything back to defaults if my VID would drop like a rock? After all, I have it manually configured for that high of a Voltage right now....

Recall that SpeedStep not only drops the multiplier, but also the voltage. In doing the vdroop pencil mod, you have essentially prevented vdroop from occuring. To what degree the pencil mod prevents vdroop is entirely a function of how much you pencil over the resistor. We can't say with any certainty where you're at because I have a feeling you did this without a multimeter?

Not only were there were dire warnings in big bold fonts plastered all over the page, but nobody who mods their boards like this really has any intention of also using SpeedStep... I think it would have been nice if they'd mentioned that somewhere on the page.

What effect the vdroop mod has on SpeedStep I don't know yet. I can't yet find anyone doing the mod who's also using SpeedStep.

Again, not applicable.

I still can't find anyone doing the vdroop mod who also uses SpeedStep, but when you re-enabled SpeedStep, did you also re-enable EIST and C1E? Give that a shot; if it still doesn't work, meh... I'm close to my wits end. I'll keep looking, but I have a feeling the pencil is what did you in.

OK, three posts while I was gone getting dinner - and not really applicable because I never did the pencil mod (But that is not your fault because you were operating under the assumption that I had performed it, and I am only now confirming that I have not). I may be crazy, but I ain't dumb - I just found out about the pencil mod last week or so, and surely ain't gonna just jump in and do it.

*however*, since I enabled Speedstep, I did *not* enable C1E - thinking that (based upon the article that Skunk posted up there in the stickies) that it was redundancy....

 

[Fumz]

lol, all that digging for nothing. Well at least it's good to know your board isn't borked because of it.

btw, where'd you go for dinner, Louisiana?

 

[xguntherc]

haha wow.. ya you must enable C1E. thats the Main part of it. Speedstep was the original NOW the newer version is C1E. but they both are in your BIOS.

you must enable C1E. Also the Pencil mod is not going to cause you to not be able to use speedstep. ALL the pencil mod does it cover the resistor. letting less out at a time. and it makes the CPU get more power more often. needing an overall less ammount of Volts.. if you do that mod your voltage will DROP in CPU-Z. not get higher.

Also if you do decide to do the pencil mod. you can always Wipe it away if you don't like it.. It's completely reversable.. unless you hurt something of course. just be careful and your good. and after your done make sure you use some Can Air to spray out the case Just in case some of the pencil dust is laying around.. Mkay!

 

[johngalt]

lol, all that digging for nothing. Well at least it's good to know your board isn't borked because of it.

btw, where'd you go for dinner, Louisiana?

Lol - as if. Nah, it was raining here and I went to get a haircut first, then grabbed dinner on the way back home. Oh, and sorry about sounding like an ass before. I should have just said I don't have the pencil mod and left it alone.

haha wow.. ya you must enable C1E. thats the Main part of it. Speedstep was the original NOW the newer version is C1E. but they both are in your BIOS.

you must enable C1E. Also the Pencil mod is not going to cause you to not be able to use speedstep. ALL the pencil mod does it cover the resistor. letting less out at a time. and it makes the CPU get more power more often. needing an overall less ammount of Volts.. if you do that mod your voltage will DROP in CPU-Z. not get higher.

Also if you do decide to do the pencil mod. you can always Wipe it away if you don't like it.. It's completely reversable.. unless you hurt something of course. just be careful and your good. and after your done make sure you use some Can Air to spray out the case Just in case some of the pencil dust is laying around.. Mkay!

Good idea - but I ma trying something different first. I think that before the reasons the auto settings were not working with the OC is because I was leaving the FSB and RAM Speeds linked, and now I have found a nice combination of them unlinked keeping the RAM at it's spec of 1000 and the FSB at 1467 (I think) to achieve 3.3 GHz - some more testing, and then I am off to create my first VM in VMWare Workstation 6.5b.

Wish me luck.

 

[xguntherc]

oh i c.

Well give her a try. I can't get stable with this ram set to 1000.. sadly thats what it's rated at. I'm not to happy with G-skill for that reason. but the ram is pretty. I have mine runnin linked and synced right now. I'm at 3.4 GHz and the RAM is auto'd to 952 or something in that area.

Good luck with your VM

 

[Everlong]

From DFI Street, since changed to DYI street, now merged with Overclockers Club, the original badass Athlon OC guide: [retro] The Original Diy-street Amd64 Overclocking Guide - OverclockersClub Forums

Thanks for that, it's what I've been looking for

 

[johngalt]

I am going to run some tests over the weekend - I have a suspicion that I can reduce the voltage on my OC rather than manually setting it because at 3.3 now it is drawing 1.4 on auto - so manually setting the V was not a good thing for me in the first place, or so it would see,

But I am having issues with VMWare Workstation 6.5b, in that the VT.ISO shows VT being enabled but as soon as I boot into Vista VMware doesn't recognize VT....

I wonder if I manually *lower* to voltage if I may actually achieve more stable OCs? That is counterintuitive to what I have interpreted from my readings, but....

 

[Fumz]

You're going to hate me for this, but I really think this might be worthwhile reading? EVGA 780i Overclocking Guide - Overclock.net - Overclocking.net

*gulp*... it's uhhhh, 130 pages. *runs for nearest exit*

Is it safe to come back yet? There's a lot of chatter you can skip, but there's also a lot of guys who've posted detailed timings. I always like this kind of thread the best... it's usually where I find guys with my exact parts.

 

[xguntherc]

yup.. Thats a decent way to start. but not finish, as every CPU is different.. But generally the reasons results vary, is because different this, or different that, different Mobo. or RAM, but if they have your same CPU. and many many many do, and that Motherboard. you should be ok to reach similar results. but just make sure your looking for VID's while doing it.