AMD® Phenom™ II Overclocking Thread

~>Dg<~ · 23 Dec 2012 at 12:46

up the volts 1 notch

run ibt 10 passes straight

dont let it go above 62c

phenoms have a wall about 3.8-3.9 and then normally want a jump in voltage this is where you work out if the extra voltage heat voltage is worth the speed increase

dfour · 23 Dec 2012 at 13:00

as DG says up the power slightly to 1.4125 or back it down to 3.7 and be happy there.

Tuvoc · 23 Dec 2012 at 13:01

~>Dg<~ said:
phenoms have a wall about 3.8-3.9 and then normally want a jump in voltage this is where you work out if the extra voltage heat voltage is worth the speed increase

Yes that is my experience. And once you give them the extra voltage to get that last bit of extra speed, you need a heck of a good cooler. I'm happy with my X6 boxes at 3.7 at stock voltage, prime95 stable.

Bromhead · 24 Dec 2012 at 00:45

I have a gigabyte motherboard ( see sig ). I've seen a few comments mentioning overclocking using gigabyte software from the desktop. I've not overclocked yet, but what real difference is there from doing it this way, where it essentially overclocks for you, or from doing it from the bios?

dfour · 24 Dec 2012 at 14:18

Bromhead said:
I have a gigabyte motherboard ( see sig ). I've seen a few comments mentioning overclocking using gigabyte software from the desktop. I've not overclocked yet, but what real difference is there from doing it this way, where it essentially overclocks for you, or from doing it from the bios?

The best and most stable (if your keeping the overclock 24/7 is in the bios). I use the software method to find whet the chip is capable as it saves a lot of messing about with bios and lock ups and when you have the settings then go into the bios and input them.
The other thing (with using software overclocking) is you can keep the machine stock when your surfing etc and then use a pre-saved software profile to overclock before gaming/rendering etc and then go back to stock when you stop instead of overclocked all the time saving heat and power.

Dayzed&Confused · 26 Dec 2012 at 13:27

~>Dg<~ said:
up the volts 1 notch

run ibt 10 passes straight

dont let it go above 62c

phenoms have a wall about 3.8-3.9 and then normally want a jump in voltage this is where you work out if the extra voltage heat voltage is worth the speed increase

My 960t does 4Ghz at 1.4125v and temps don't go above 40c after 3 hours of Prime, on a fairly cheap cooler, does that mean my monitoring software is off, or do I have an outlying chip?

~>Dg<~ · 26 Dec 2012 at 14:37

something aint right noway a phenom is doing 4ghz or above at 40c on ibt or prime .

Dayzed&Confused · 26 Dec 2012 at 15:22

especially on a 12 quid cooler, would mean that cpuz, HWmonitor and AOD are all malfunctioning, along with their linux counterparts, little disconcerting.

CAT-THE-FIFTH · 26 Dec 2012 at 15:30

The Phenom II X4 960T is based on the Phenom II X6 die,so if not unlocked should run cooler than a normal Phenom II X4.

However,40C does seem low - how hot does the heatsink feel BTW??

Dayzed&Confused · 26 Dec 2012 at 15:50

Heatsink feels reasonably cool, not much warmer than it was at stock.

~>Dg<~ · 26 Dec 2012 at 17:26

just run ibt 5 runs and montior it with one of your temp progs and print screenshot

show min and max temp and clock

OvEr_KiLL · 26 Dec 2012 at 20:13

ok newbie overclocker here..just overclocked my 965 black edition to 3.8ghz i did try 4.0 but it wouldnt handle it..wouldnt boot just kept restarting on windows loading screen.
voltage is on auto currently around 1.344 vcore (keeps changing?)
idles around 35-39c is that ok?
specs are
asus m5a97 r2.0
Xigmatek Aegir SD with extra 120mm fan on the back
Kingston hyperX genesis running at 1333mhz (i think, as the cpu limits it right?)
msi 6950
XFX 850w PSU

dfour · 27 Dec 2012 at 01:17

if thats stable thats a nice result

Now get the ram to run at 1600 as that is the sweet spot for ddr 3 and will give improvements over 1333 speed.

danny77 · 28 Dec 2012 at 21:10

overkill i wouldnt worry too much about idle temps you should pay more attention to how hot the chip gets when its stressed, what temps are you getting whilst running prime or intel burn test ?

OvEr_KiLL · 29 Dec 2012 at 19:55

danny77 said:
overkill i wouldnt worry too much about idle temps you should pay more attention to how hot the chip gets when its stressed, what temps are you getting whilst running prime or intel burn test ?

with prime95 running it goes up to 48c

and thats with the cpu on turbo mode!

MouseMat2004 · 30 Dec 2012 at 11:35

I have a X4 960T, been running happy at 3.6Ghz unlocked 6 cores at stock voltage for the last 12months or so. Been looking at getting a little more juice out of it.

Does going back to 4 cores increase the overclocking ability and whats the recommend max voltage? Any other dos and donts with regards to FSB/HT etc clocking?

I have a Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro cooler, but not the greatest airflow in my case (plus Crossfire ATI's that run fairly toasty) naturally I can keep an eye on the temps but just need some decent safe guidelines.

Jason2 · 30 Dec 2012 at 14:25

Does the 965 perform better than the i3 3220 in games? Lot of people have told me the i3 is the better chip.

dfour · 30 Dec 2012 at 15:04

I think they are both roughly the same except in skyrim where the i3 is better but the i3 cant be overclcoked to improve the results and the phenom can.

Jason2 · 30 Dec 2012 at 15:05

dfour said:
I think they are both roughly the same except in skyrim where the i3 is better but the i3 cant be overclcoked to improve the results and the phenom can.

How does the 965 perform in fsx? Any idea?

dfour · 30 Dec 2012 at 15:15

fsx = flight sim 10??

if it is you would be better off with an i5 or i7 IMHO