2500k settings and help

Teaf · 22 May 2015 at 22:32

Bit late to the party with the 2500k overclock and a total newbie at overclocking, but I'm told it's easy to overclock a 2500k. I've been reading up on it for a bit and finally decided to do it after getting better cooling. I'm at 4.5 Ghz at the moment which is what I was aiming for. BIOS is showing 1.34v for the Vcore. I cannot get an accurate reading in Windows on any program I use (Gigabyte Z68P-DS3) for the Vcore. The VID is reporting to be 1.39v - 1.426v, but I'm told this is what the CPU wants but isn't necessarily getting, and it's getting whatever the Vcore is? Which is 1.34v from the BIOS? Although I do have LLC on, not sure if that affects it much.

I've ran 10 runs of "Maximum" IBT and it did spit out an error but it completed all the tests successfully and the error came at the end when the results had finished. The "Results" column shows the expected correct results so I'm guessing this is not an issue with the overclock?

I've also ran Prime95 for 4 hours and didn't have any trouble. My temps are 68c - 79c (the lowest core to the highest core) and those are highest recorded through all the testing.

I'm going to run Prime95 for a longer period over night, but I did want to ask:

1. The VID isn't actually the Vcore is it? So I'm not running at 1.426v on the Vcore?
2. Are the temperatures fine? I know these programs stress the CPU more than any game usually would.

My BIOS is quite weird and I don't have a specific "VCore" option, I only have a "Dynamic" one which appears to be an offset. The weird thing is I've set it to +0.05v, booted into Windows, ran the tests and the temperatures are the same. Then I've tried at 0.000v offset and -0.04v offset, ran the tests, and the temps are still the same. What I am missing here? I've also checked the Vcore in the BIOS when it was at 0.00v and it shows 1.344v. It also showed that when I had it at -0.02v. But when I had it at +0.04v it was 1.38v. Basically, I've no idea what this BIOS is doing

Teaf · 25 May 2015 at 10:41

My board doesn't have levels for LLC, it's just simply on or off. Judging from temperatures and checking Google I'd assume "On" is like level 10. I'm also assuming the CPU voltage is automatically calculated based on frequency and multiplier as you can't manually set the Vcore. If I boot up with a 33x multiplier the Vcore in BIOS is wildly different to the Vcore if I boot up with a 45x multiplier. I'm using the offset to get it to the level I want, but this affects both load and idle. If I get 1.4v in the BIOS and want to aim for 1.35v I need an offset of -0.05v. But, this will affect the idle and if it's idling at 1.00v then the offset will make it 0.95v and could make it unstable when idle.

With LLC off, the 45x multiplier gives 1.32v in the BIOS with no adjustment to the Vcore. I've adjusted that to +0.03v so the BIOS is reading 1.356v, and since LLC is totally off there should not be any Vgain, only Vdroop. 10 loops of IBT at Maximum stress and then an additional hour in Prime95 Blend puts temps at 63c - 73c (lowest to highest cores). I've dropped about 6c compared to my original overclock, so I'd imagine the Vcore has definitely changed but no program in Windows so far that I've found will given an accurate Vcore reading. All of them either report the VID or the VTT voltage, even Gigabytes own stuff. It seems stable though but I'll test it more.

Teaf · 25 May 2015 at 15:06

I do have a "CPU VCORE" on HWM but it shows as 1.044 (or 1.056 under load) which I believe is the VTT. On my BIOS (also not the UEFI) the first option is LLC, there's no option above it unfortunately.

Teaf · 26 May 2015 at 08:36

wazza300 said:
you cant use llc and dvid together on that board far as I remember,its one or the other

try disabling llc and set dvid,you can also use a negative dvid to take off cpu voltage so try -0.010 and so on till you get the load cpu voltage lower

Yeah, I turned LLC off and added +0.03 DVID which gives 1.35v. It's probably a tad high but without being able to read the Vcore in Windows I can't see what it's like under load. I've dropped 6c at load turning LLC off though and just adding some voltage to the DVID. It seems perfectly stable so I can live with that.

Thanks for the help all.