Struggling for 4ghz stability

Soldato
Joined
29 May 2005
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West London
Spec is DFI X58 LP UT-X58-T3eH8 , i7 920 D0 (Batch 39 etc), 6gb Patriot 1600Mhz 8-8-8-24 & Noctua cooler.

It runs happily at 190x20=3800Mhz, 1520Mhz on RAM, 1.35V Vcore and 1.4V VTT/QPI, but I cannot get it stable at 200x20 or 21x191 for 4ghz.

I realise I can probably lower the VTT/Vcore at 3800Mhz, want to get to 4ghz though :D

Any ideas? Bit afraid to go higher on Vcore and QPI...
 
CPU PLL Voltage:.................1.80v
IOH/ICH 1.1V Voltage:............1.11v
IOH Analog Voltage:..............1.10v
ICH 1.5 Voltage:.................1.5v
ICH 1.05V Voltage:...............1.05v
 
Those voltages seem really high for a D0 i920.

Most people on here are hitting 4GHz with less than 1.3v Vcore and QPI.

There are plenty of threads on this board that will help you out.

See JonJ's thread here for some useful links on how to get your chip to 4GHz.. if you look at the Gigabyte 4GHz o/c guide, just take into account that this guide was written for C0 chips, so the voltages they used are irrelevant, as D0 chips generally require lower voltages to get stable.

Well, I should say MOST D0's need lower voltages, there are still some D0's that are poor clockers, and I have even came across some that cannot hit 4GHz no matter how much voltage you pump into them.

Also, I have noticed that using to much Vcore or QPI can result in instability to, you really have to try and find your chip's sweet spots with these voltage settings, if you look at the EVGA i7 voltages explained guide in JonJ's thread, it explains what each voltage is for, and how it can help you acheive a stable o/c..

A few things that might be causing your system to cripple is if you have got Performance Enhance set to Turbo, if you do, this can cause instability, so try knocking it back to Standard.

I find that having Loadline Calibration enabled makes it a lot easier to stabilize your o/c, however if you choose to keep this disabled, then remember that you will have to compensate for the Vdroop that happens when this is disabled, the UD5 tends to have about .09v of Vdroop.

Remember to that uncore multi should be at least 2x your mem multi, so if you use 8x mem multi, uncore needs to be set to 16x, you can use higher uncore multi's, but there isn't any need to, twice that of the mem multi is what most people use, although I have heard a few people say that raising it up to 17x instead of 16x has helped stabilize their o/c.

Another thing to do is before you start tweaking BIOS settings, is to first load optimized defaults from the main BIOS screen, then save and exit, then re-enter the BIOS and start your tweaking, I was advised to do this from a person on another forum, all it really does is sets CPU and PCIe clock drive to 800mV and 900Mv respectively, this seems to help stabilize your o/c also.

With the QPI multiplier, just set this to 36x (the lowest value) as you don't really want to use any of the higher multis as this is going to cause problems as well.

In the Advanced Clock Control section of M.I.T I set my PCIe clock to 102MHz instead of leaving it on auto, as people seem to say this has a positive effect when clocking your chip, tbh I haven't tried leaving it on auto to see if it does make any difference, so I can't say for sure if it helps or not, I just like to have most things set manually in the BIOS.

If you haven't set your RAM timings manually, then please do so, set them according you your memorys spec.

Set IOH Core to 1.140v as well, because the motherboard will overvolt this if you leave it on auto.

Have a read of some of those guides I posted on Jon's thread, and try some of the suggestions I have given you here, and let us know how you get on.

Good luck mate.
 
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Thanks mate, tried a few things (1.39Vcore, 1.4V VTT), it just won't get stable. Too low a VTT (eg 1.3V) and Windows won't even boot (Freezes on startup screen). Memory is fine.

Not sure what I can do to get it there, I've read the Batch 39 etc chips aren't that good at clocking. Annoying because it runs rock solid at 3.8ghz fine.

Oh well, not a bencher and 3.8ghz feels blisteringly fast anyway!
 
Both of my chips are from batch 3921A and I would say they are both very good clockers, both will do 4GHz with 1.248v Vcore under load.

The one I have in my rig is currently at 4.2GHz now.

And I have one validated in CPUZ at 4.5GHz and the other at 4.6GHz.

Though the last chip I had before these 2 was 3910A501, and it was an absolute dog!

It wouldn't do 4GHz no matter what I tried, also the temps were really messed up to, used to idle at 53c at stock frequency, I tested it with 4 different HSF's, and got the same high temps everytime.

It would only clock to 3.8GHz like yours, it wouldn't do 4GHz no matter how much Vtt and Vcore I pushed through it.

Luckily for me, OcUK took it back and sent another one out to me.
 
it was an absolute dog!
This is always the tricky part during the overclocking process when you run into problems and you don't know if:

  • Your doing something wrong, is the BIOS not configured correctly etc?
  • This chip not a good overclocker?
People see others peoples clocks on the forums, check their BIOS settings etc but they just can't reach their overclocking targets, eventually you either settle on your best clock or you swap out chips. I always seem to think I'm doing something wrong and spends ages working through all the variables trying to get that elusive extra few hundred MHz out the bag, then you swap out chips and the new one overclocks with ease! :p

It's such a lottery, even two chips from the same batch/revision/factory can perform differently! :cool:
 
This is always the tricky part during the overclocking process when you run into problems and you don't know if:

  • Your doing something wrong, is the BIOS not configured correctly etc?
  • This chip not a good overclocker?
People see others peoples clocks on the forums, check their BIOS settings etc but they just can't reach their overclocking targets, eventually you either settle on your best clock or you swap out chips. I always seem to think I'm doing something wrong and spends ages working through all the variables trying to get that elusive extra few hundred MHz out the bag, then you swap out chips and the new one overclocks with ease! :p

It's such a lottery, even two chips from the same batch/revision/factory can perform differently! :cool:

I kept thinking that it was me that was doing something wrong with my previous chip, I would sit up through the early hours of the morning for nights on end testing different BIOS settings and different BIOS'es in an attempt to get it up to 4GHz.

Not to mention all the times I removed my HSF to swap it out for another one because of the ridiculous temps I was experiencing with that chip.

I asked people on various forums about the temp issues, and everyone kept saying "it's a bad mount mate, try reseating your HSF", in the end I wasted half a tube of AS5, and tested 4 different coolers (2 x TRUE's, 9700NT, and stock) and no matter what I did, those temps were always really high, I mean, at stock using a TRUE with 2 fans in push/pull the idle temps were hitting 53c, and under load it would shoot up to the mid 70's..

Anyway, I got in touch with a tech here, and told him that I wasn't happy with the chip and explained about the temps, so they told me to send it back and have it replaced.

And as soon as I recieved the replacement chip and dropped it into my machine, everything was perfect, idle temps at stock were in the low 30's and loads were around 55 iirc, and the first attempt at 4GHz went as smooth as butter!!

The whole lottery thing is spot on, no two chips are the same, hell the two I have here have identical batch numbers, and they are nothing a like..

Obviously I tested both chips in my box, and kept the best one to myself and gave the other to the missus!! :D
 
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