Diagnosing Errors Guide

[Quango]

It seems to me that there are different types of instability that occurs during overclocking. Is there a guide that explains what the most likely causes and how to address them?

e.g. four types of crash:

1. Failure to boot/BIOS/POST
2. Failure during OS load
3. Crash/freeze during stress tests
4. Errors detected in Prime95

 

[Quango]

Not sure I fully accept that is the case.. for example there is a big difference between an error in Prime95 (where the system keeps running) and a crash or lockup.

So far I just have to try loads of different little combinations, with a growing Excel spreadsheet to track them all.

 

[Quango]

Thanks for the reply..

I just thought that a minor computation error in prime is a bit different from a system lockup or a failure to post. But I do understand that a memory OR cpu error might result in either result..

It means overclockers are a bit like a blind men trying to slowly move forward.. but when they hit something in every direction, it doesn't help tell them which the right way is, just that that's not it..

Example: In one case I set FSB to 340 and tried repeated upping Vcore till I reached 1.4V - I know other Q6600s have run at this speed with much lower voltage, yet I was getting Prime errors. So VCore was not the cause. I tried tweaking NB/SB/HT/VTT and errors got slower to appear (2.5 hours in one case). Eventually I slowed the memory a bit and bingo, stable. So VCore was nothing to do with it.. having got it stable I was able to drop vCore back to 1.325V