Q9550 overclocking

allday247

allday247

allday247

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Have recently replaced my trusty E6750 oc'd to 3.6Ghz @ 1.3v, Ram running 1:1 @ 900Mhz, with a Q9550 E0 stepping.

Now i needed to upgrade my mobo BIOS to get it to recognise the chip properly but doing so brought about a whole new set of OC features i wasn't familiar with prior to the flash.

So Hardware:
CPU: Q9550
Mobo: ASUS P5K-E wifi edition.
Ram: 4GB (2x2GB) Geil Black Dragon DDR2 800MHz
Cooler: Thermalright Ultra120 + 1 x Noctua NF-P12


So plonking the chip in and running at stock I have the following temps. (Retrieved using CoreTemp 0.99.7)

- Idle -
Core1: 39°C
Core2: 26°C
Core3: 24°C
Core4: 37°C

- Load -
Core1: 44°C
Core2: 41°C
Core3: 39°C
Core4: 39°C

Obviously i have suck sensors but at least they function on load. 1 core (core1) is a few degrees higher than the others. should i worry about this?

Current Overclock:

CPU: 3.6Ghz (to at least match my previous chip)
FSB - 425
CPU voltage - 1.2250V ( i could probably drop it but haven't had time to experiment)
Ram: 1021Mhz 5-5-5-15 (ratio 5:6)

This runs stable with 1hrs of Orthos and OCCT but will run longer sessions later.


- Idle -
Core1: 39°C
Core2: 29°C
Core3: 28°C
Core4: 37°C

- Load -
Core1: 50°C
Core2: 47°C
Core3: 46°C
Core4: 46°C

Now a few questions.
1) My ram seems to now be set at 1021Mhz. This is faster than my previous speed of 900Mhz, when the E6750 was oc'd with a 1:1 ratio with the FSB. Now even if the Ram is running at 1021Mhz is the ram bottle necked by the FSB (425)?

2) I'm going to run the CPU at 3.8Ghz with the FSB set to 450. Should I then put the ram to run 1:1 and hence the effective speed will be 900Mhz? or should i keep it at a faster Mhz?

3) Temperature. Core1 sometimes can get 6°C hotter than the other cores. should i worry? Should i look at getting a new heat sink to reduce the temps further? or are my current temps ok for air cooling.

4) Apart from CPU voltage, all other voltages are on auto. is this fine?

5) CPU @ 4Ghz is it worth it?

Cheers :D
 
a 3.6ghz will show a very nice boost over a 3.6ghz on your previous chip, personally i'd be happy with that.
 
oh i'm happy that i easily got to 3.6ghz on the new chip and can definitely see the improvement in games and general snappiness of Windows but I would like to know whether pushing to 3.8Ghz and running the ram at 1:1 ratio would be more beneficial or should I get the CPU to 3.8 and have the ram run as fast as possible.

Also i'm not 100% happy that core 1 can get 6°C out when on load :(
 
Id say 6C difference between cores is normal. I have mine at 3.6ghz because it is the furthest I can OC with default volts, so I can have my fans on a lower setting (less noise).

If you want 3.8ghz I would get the CPU stable first with your ram lower than rated speed, and then see how far you can push your ram as it might be your NB that limits the ram speed, not the ram itself due to the strain of a quad over a dual.

As for temps, keep it below 70C, and keep checking the volts. I don't like the auto settings as you never know what your mobo is putting through your components.
 
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I've managed 3.8Ghz with 1.3v on a P45 board known to not play nice with quads (overclocks duals like mad though).

Had to upgrade my RAM from 800mhz to get it working, but other than that it was a doddle.
 
i think it's a common problem, 1 core is slightly hotter than the others. i got the same problem as well. i prefer 1:1 ratio.
 
My Board is a P35 board and the RAM was absolutely fine running at 900MHZ 1:1 with the E6750.

So if i'm looking for a 1:1 ratio then getting the CPU to 3.8Ghz would be ideal.
Hopefully the extra 200Mhz doesn't heat the chip too much.
 
krooton said:
I've managed 3.8Ghz with 1.3v on a P45 board known to not play nice with quads (overclocks duals like mad though).

Had to upgrade my RAM from 800mhz to get it working, but other than that it was a doddle.
Click to expand...
Nonsense, P45 boards are the best for clocking 45nm quads/duals, i had 3.8ghz on a q9550 with ease, 1.216 vcore on a p5q deluxe p45 board, easiest overclock ive ever done, 1.3v, that couldnt have been an EO, i used both ocz reaper pc8500 and reaper pc6400, the same p45 board clocked a q6600 to 3.8ghz with ease, x48 boards are the worst with 45nm cpu's, many dont go above 450 fsb, for a p45 this is bog standard.
 
krooton said:
I've managed 3.8Ghz with 1.3v on a P45 board known to not play nice with quads (overclocks duals like mad though).

Had to upgrade my RAM from 800mhz to get it working, but other than that it was a doddle.
Click to expand...

Total rubbish. I had a top of range x38 board and couldnlt even get my q9650 to 4Ghz. Once I bought a p45 board I had 4Ghz at 1.19v, 4.25Ghz at 1.29v and 4.65Ghz at 1.395v prime stable. The best benchmarking overclock I acheived was 4.86Ghz and the max overclcok was 4.94Ghz.

You need a p45 to get the best out of a 45nm quad. FACT.
 
I remember your early clocking exploits Greebo with the q9650, some great results;). Also, in another post, you said you were an i7 clocking virgin, seen your 950 results so far, very impressive for a virgin mate, nice one, gotta get this 920 of mine under water, 4.0ghz is a bit boring.:)
 
wish i had a P45 board :)
Oh well, so far there has been nothing wrong with my P35 *touch wood* but I might experience it's limitations come overclocking the Quad.

Right update time:

I wanted to run the ram at a ratio of 1:1 with the FSB as i wasn't very comfortable running the ram at 1021Mhz (80Mhz is it's rated speed). so i've bumped the FSB to 450 (from 425) and now have the CPU running at 3.8Ghz and ram @ 900Mhz. Volts set to 1.225

- Idle -
Core1: 39°C - stuck sensor
Core2: 29°C
Core3: 28°C
Core4: 37°C - stuck sensor

Ran 2 instances of Orthos through the night.

Core 1 failed after 1 hr and 30 mins.

- Load temps -
Core1: 54°C
Core2: 50°C
Core3: 49°C
Core4: 50°C

Now the other instance of orthos (cores 3 and 4) was still running when i woke up, so could anyone help me identify where my problem could be.
I doubt it is a heat issue so do you think i could do with more volts to make it more stable? the revision of my Q9550 is E0.

Just a reminder that my previous chip (E6750) was fine with the 450FSB and ram was fine at 900Mhz for 3years.
 
setter said:
I remember your early clocking exploits Greebo with the q9650, some great results;). Also, in another post, you said you were an i7 clocking virgin, seen your 950 results so far, very impressive for a virgin mate, nice one, gotta get this 920 of mine under water, 4.0ghz is a bit boring.:)
Click to expand...

I must say so far I am finding it easier than overclocking the q9650. There only really seems to be 3 voltages to play around with until you get to high end where I'm sure extra tweeking will be required.

Water does help, a lot ;)

To: allday247, it may be your vcore but it also might be your NB voltage. Just cause your E6750 could run fine with a 450 fsb, it doesn't follow with a q9550. Dual chips in mobo's can always run at higher FSB than quads. Even with my p45 board it was quite common to see dual core cpus running at 500+ fsb but very rare to get quads stable at the same FSB.


Funnily enough 443 was the max stable fsb I could get my x38 board. 1 fsb greater and prime would fall over. I played around with voltages on everything and even silly voltages before I discovered that with a quad 443 was the max FSB I was ever going to get on my motherboard and then bought the p45 board.

So it could be that 450 is too much for your p35 board. I also seem to remember when I had a p35 board that the northbridge used to get silly hot when overclocking and prime would fall over when it hit a certain temp without fail even though the cpu temps were fine. Just something to keep an eye on.

But go for some more vcore, you seem to have plenty of scope left temprature wise.
 
I must be lucky as I get my Q9650 to 4ghz on a P5E x38 board, would like to try a P45 though, only thing stopping me is having to buy new Mosfet blocks.
Agree with greebo I was able to get 500 fsb with a dual core on my x38 but the quads wont go anywhere near it, can get 4.2ghz but with lots of volts in all areas
 
I've got my Q9550 on a P35 @ 3.5 at stock volts if that's any kind of help as a yardstick for you.
 
I was able to get to 3.6 happily just want to push that little bit further to keep the ram at 1:1 (though i'm not sure of the benefits to this).

Thanks for the advise Greebo and others. Going to have to look at upping volts. BTW what app is used to monitor the NorthBridge temps? CoreTemp doesnt do this right?

Oh and with my Orthos fail on 1 core. Is that actually the core failing or is it ram?
 
From memory I Everest shows NB temps. However, not all mobos have NB temp probes fitted. I once had one which didn't but working on the basis that the heatsink would burn my skin, I figured it was too hot ;)
 
Ahhh cool, i actually have Everest installed. Just haven't run it recently >_<
So are there any 'boundaries' i should look out for on the NB temps?

Thanks again Greebo, you've been very helpful :)
 
I never said P45 was bad for clocking quads, I said my P45, a Biostar TPower i45, does not clock quads that well.

I got my E8500 to 4.2Ghz with no issues, but getting my Q9550 stable at 3.8Ghz took extensive tweaking.
 
When i had the 9550 it took a lot of tweaking to get stable @3.8Ghz but it can be done, what version have you got the EO was able to get to 4ghz at a push.

And dont worry about the difference in temps mine were all over the place (10C difference at idle going down to 6 when under stress) even after lapping, remember that the temps are sort of guesswork anyway just treat the highest temperature as the one to work with.

The temps you are getting are well within spec, i think mine was topping out at 65C under load as long as they are under 75C under stress its all good.
 
Thanks Sayso.
I have an E0 revision chip, so it should fly. I just need to learn how to OC more than the usual as i'm only familiar with FSB upping and voltage to the CPU.

Overclocking my dual was easier :p
 
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