New to O/C - some advice

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Hi all,

I've had a i920 (Asus p6t) for a while running on stock fan / clock and thought I'd try to see how easy it was to modestly overclock it and if it was ok to do it on the current setup.

I ended up with a stable 3.3 ish after upping to 166 bclk. Keeping my Corsair 1333 XMS3 ram at that rate.

The problem was that when I bought this (had it built) I was on a budget that kept me from really getting what was needed for overclocking. I have good parts but the case is only a Coolermaster Elite 3xx series.

After using pc probe II I was encouraged before I realised that the core temps and cpu temp were not the same thing.

So after using Realtemp and running prime95 (worst case was 100 degrees and much of the time it's in the 70s - stable though), I figured it was not a good idea to o/c even to 3gh without some extra cooling.

When I started looking at the coolers and their height it became obvious that the case was too small for a lot of them apart from the impressive Cogage True Spirit (which is simply not available anywhere in the UK).

I've now ordered a HAF 912 and (as I need a bit more memory) some Corsair XMS3 Dominator 1600. More than I expected but it was clear the case really needed to be better on cooling.

What concerns me is the space on the p6t Deluxe with the high ram heatsinks and other heatsinks in the near vicinity. Some of the coolers out there may be unsuitable. I was wondering if there were any coolers to avoid and if it's worth considering the Corsair H50 as an alternative to fitting a massive monster that might collide with something? Do I need to spend that much even?

I'm looking at these possibilities (which I think are physically suitable), perhaps some of you experienced o/clockers can comment and / or suggest any other possibilities :

Thermalright Ultra 120
Noctua u12p
Corsair H50

Given that I am not going to try for 4ghz. 3.4 (or 3.8 tops) would be good and the object would be to keep the temps well within the comfort zone.

I've spend more than I expected to on this project. :)
 
Hi and welcome to the forums.:)

Thermalright ultra extreme fits grand on the p6t deluxe, (v2 here). Im also using ocz reaper ram that has extremely tall heatsinks, fits fine as well.

IMG_1482.jpg


I still have room if i go to 12gb, but ill always be limited to 25mm depth 120mm fans on the cooler regardless of how much ram i have.
 
Great! The picture is exactly what I needed to see. I've the deluxe v1 but the layout looks pretty much the same so this is useful.

Do you think I'd make do with one fan for the o/c I intend? And you have any figures that demonstrate the difference between a one/two fan set up?

I'm still considering the H50 but I expect I'd need the push pull on that and I'm not clear what fans I'd need to replace the stock with. 15 quid per fan (+ splitters) starts to get expensive if that's what one has to aim at. eg the Alaska Apache?

Is it really that bad an idea to use the supplied fan and add another ?
 
Yep, the v2 and v1 are identical, only difference is that the sas controller is removed on the v2. For the oc you intend, one fan will be grand, i noticed a drop of about 4c when adding a second. Ive no experience of using the H50 with its stock fans as i only tried one for a day with my current akasa vipers installed on it.
 
Thanks Setter, - great dogs btw, I presume those are your babies? (I do dog photography so always keen to see pics of them).

@The Asgard

If I were to use push / pull can the fans be regulated ? - I understand Corsair's recommendation is full power all the time. I would like to have a reasonably quiet system when it's not under heavy load if possible. If regulation is possible how would I do this? splitter down to the pwm on the mb?
 
No, fraid not just have that pic up as a reference to my nickname, i used to keep German short haired pointers though.

Ah ok. :-)

If you were using two PWM fans, id highly reccomend the akasa PWM splitter cable.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CB-031-AK&groupid=701&catid=48&subcat=

Best £3.50 ive ever spent, used it with several brands of PWM fans for a few years now.

Yes I was looking at those splitters. Good idea to take power from the psu and sensing from the mb. I'll probably go with that if the fans I choose are pwm.
 
Thanks Setter, - great dogs btw, I presume those are your babies? (I do dog photography so always keen to see pics of them).

@The Asgard

If I were to use push / pull can the fans be regulated ? - I understand Corsair's recommendation is full power all the time. I would like to have a reasonably quiet system when it's not under heavy load if possible. If regulation is possible how would I do this? splitter down to the pwm on the mb?

Actually I had the push running at 7 volts and I ran the pull from the CPU header. Worked well and was pretty much silent.
 
If you were using two PWM fans, id highly reccomend the akasa PWM splitter cable.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CB-031-AK&groupid=701&catid=48&subcat=

Best £3.50 ive ever spent, used it with several brands of PWM fans for a few years now.


Setter, sorry to revive an old thread but I;d like some advice on how best to set the pwm control on the Asus. I had Q-fan enabled but this seeems to lower my current fan to 933 rpm whatever I do. It ramps up when under load but doesn't allow me to specify the lower setting.

When I disable q-fan, the fan then runs at almost full speed with some variance presumably controlled by the epu engine. I can't seem to take control of this and when finally getting the cooler I want in my system I'd like to be able to keep the cpu cooler than it is when q-fan backs off. Right now on idle it lets the core go into the 50s.

How have you set your bios up to control your two fans cpu fans and are you using the Asus fan expert (I've not loaded that up)?
 
Im using the turbo setting for qfan in bios for the cpu fans, (2 x akasa vipers, 600-1900 rpm), in windows ive used ai suites fan expert to calibrate the fans, turbo profile as well, the fans run from 1200-1500 rpm, only ramping up to full speed when the cpu cores are at 100% load. Personally ive never used the asus epu 6 utility, as once you start overclocking it doesnt work, havent even got it installed now. Id suggest setting the turbo profile, then set turbo in asus ai suite and calibrate the fan settings, which fan are you using btw.
 
Ah ok! I hadn't loaded fan expert this time after reformatting and starting again.

The fan I have is only the stock one at the moment, I'm about to order a cooler but still undecided which one I'm going to get. Having got the HAF 922 I'm pretty much ready to transfer stuff over. The fan tests were to see what control I had and how it was all going to work.

I also found that my version of Speedfan (4.41) didn't control the cpu fan but the previous version does even when q-fan is on. Bios still maintains some kind of control as the fan cannot be lowered past a certain point (a good thing actually).

I'll load up Ai Suite as you suggest and take a look at the fan expert. I never really explored that.

Thanks for the info. I'm leaning towards the h50 at the moment and maybe I'll see how the single fan does. I might then opt for two swif2 fans in push pull config. The only thing that bothers me is using the back vent as an intake when it was really designed as an outtake. The Haf 922 is the windowed version so I don't have the option of a side exhaust. The only exhaust will be on top via 200mm 700rpm fan.

BTW. I've also noticed that even with turbo my fan is still not on full. It seems to be running around 2100. The only thing that pushes this up to 2400+ is if I turn down the case fan. This appears to be something I can't control but it may just be a quirk of the stock fan rather than the Asus trying to be extra clever.
 
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