Should I be happy with 4Ghz from a Q9650

Slinkie

Slinkie

Slinkie

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Hi Folks,

I have managed to get my Q9650 to 4ghz reletively easily but of course I want it to go a lot higher. I'd ideally like 4.3.

I am using a DFI Lanparty X48 LT motherboard and 4gb of OCZ 1066 ram.

I'm sure I can get this higher than 4 but am really struggling with the GTLs and the VTT settings. I have found guides online on how to set them or where to start but nothing seems to work. (I'm not sure if the guides are motherboard specific or based on 65nm quads rather than 45nm)

Does anyone have any guidance on how I can increase my clock? Some places stated they could get 485fsb without having to touch the VTT and the GTLs but I am no where near that.

I think my current settings are (all upped a bit more than they need to be just to make sure the pc is rock solid for the time being)

Vcore 1.37
NB voltage 1.5
Ram voltage 2.2
sb/ppl is default (1.51 I think)
ram timings are 5-5-5-18
can't think of anything else, if you need any more info I'll restart and make a note of my bios settings
 
I get to 4ghz without messing with the GTLs (I think VVT is around 1.3) I'll have to check that.

The reason I think I can get it a lot higher is that at 4 ghz the GTLs are not even tweaked. I have read that getting them right can sometimes mean an extra 50fsb. However I don't want to think about how many hours I have put into trying loads of different methods.

One thing I did notice was that the vcore seems really high so I'm currently in the process of just finding out the highest fsb I can get at stock volts and everything else stock and maybe try and work my way up to 4Ghz again. I am currently selling a Q9550 in the MM and posted a screen shot of the CPU-z and I didn't realise but I managed to get that to run at 4.2 with 1.35 vcore.
 
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Ok,

I started from stock again and got to 4Ghz again trying to keep everything as low as possible

My bios is as follows

CLOCK VC0 divider: AUTO
CPU Clock Ratio: 9x
- Target CPU Clock:4005
CPU Clock: 445
Boot Up Clock: AUTO
DRAM Speed: 333/667
- Target DRAM Speed: 891
PCIE Clock: 110MHz
PCIE Slot Config: 1X 1X

CPU Spread Spectrum: Disabled
PCIE Spread Spectrum: Disabled
SATA Spread Spectrum: Disabled

Voltage Settings
CPU VID Control: 1.34
CPU VID Special Add: Auto
DRAM Voltage Control: 2.23V
SB Core/CPU PLL Voltage: 1.510V
NB Core Voltage: 1.43v
CPU VTT Voltage: 1.28v
Vcore Droop Control: Disabled
Clockgen Voltage Control: 3.45v
GTL+ Buffers Strength: Strong
Host Slew Rate: Weak
GTL REF Voltage Control:Disabled
x CPU GTL1/3 REF Volt:
x CPU GTL 0/2 REF Volt:
x North Bridge GTL REF Volt:

Can anyone see anything here that needs to change. The reason why I am not that happy with 4Ghz is that my Pc is water cooled. I have around £300 worth of cooling stuff in there (maybe more) and I think 4ghz is a good clock for air cooling so it seems like my water cooling is not really being utilised.

EDIT it seems that as soon as I raise the FSB over 450 the pc will post but upon loading windows vista the green progress bar just freezes and I have to restart my pc. Is this something to do with GTLs? I thought GTLs worked soley in relation to VTT and so if I can get into windows at 450FSB with what I deem a fairly high VTT why can I not get in with 455 with the same VTT settings
 
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I'm never happy :)

It just seems a shame that my old Q9550 was rock solid at 4.2ghz and that was with a 8.5 multi. The Q9650 as a 9x multi so I would expect it to go even higher but I can't get it right, it's these damn GTL settings I think. It seems a waste to have all this water cooling in my pc when I am runnig my CPU at a speed I could do with air cooling.
 
Give it 1.55 PLL and up the vtt to 1.35, leave GTL's on auto to begin with.

Freezing on load generally can be either CPU or mem/chipset, x48 boards seem to love nb volts as well.

Dont give up on it yet!!
 
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