Getting my Q6600 to 3.6GHz - any ideas?

Rikki

Rikki

Rikki

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Joined
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Posts
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Location
Glasgow, Scotland
Hi folks,

Last week I bit the bullet and order £70 worth of cooling from OC.

Thermalright Ultra Extreme 120
Arctic Silver 5 compound
Noctua NFP12 fan

Stripped out my mobo and ditched the Intel stock HSF combo then lapped the Q6600 chip down to wet and dry 1200 grit and did the same with the bottom of the TRUE.

Not knowing a lot about overclocking (last time I did it was my Celeron 300a system) I did some reading and have had the system booting and running prime for 2 hours with the following settings:

8x
425
spd 2 (850) 5-5-5-15
ddr +0.2v

= 3.4GHz - temps after 2 hours on Prime was 51c across the cores


My systems spec is:

Q6600 G0 chip
Above mentioned cooling
Gigabyte P35C-DS3R rev1 - latest BIOS
4x GEIL Value 1GB DDR2 PC6400

Is trying to aim for 3.6GHz a possibility and what should I try to get there. I read a little more on the net and tried the following settings and although Windows would boot and I could run Prime it fell over in 3 seconds with errors.

9x
400
spd 2 (800) 5-5-5-15
ddr v +0.2v
fsb +0.1
g(mch +0.2n
cpu v 1.40v

(I also tried 8x450 but windows wouldnt even load up fully)

What would you recommend I try to get it clock at 3.6 or as close to as possible.

Thanks folks,

R.
 
Last edited:
1.4v is quite low. Especially if that's whats's set in BIOS and not what is read in Windows (could be as low as 1.3-1.325v in Windows under load).
 
1.4V is very low for a Q6600 to try for 3.6GHz. Mine needs 1.525V with the loadline calibration switched on.
 
beh* said:
Oh IC. I have an option that dampens vdroop on my P5K. Lol, i bet your vid is allot better than mine (1.3).
Click to expand...

At a best guess, You'd need 1.47-1.53v to get 3.6Ghz stable. Every manufactured chip is different but generally speaking if you have a low VID, it will require lower volts for a good overclock. My Q6600 did 3.6 from 1.4675v(BIOS) but under load in windows dropped back to 1.4v, VID was 1.2865v I think.

Personally I wouldn't go past 1.55v whilst load temps are under 70 degrees.
 
~TB~ said:
My Q6600 will goto 3.6 on "auto" voltage
Click to expand...

You definitely do get 'Golden' CPUs that are just much better than usual. The Q6600 VIDs are dropping too - the first one I bought was 1.3V, the latest is 1.225V. MInd you - my Q9450 is 1.15V but it still seems to need 1.5V for 4GHz.
 
finally got mine running, go stepping with a vid of 1.2750. gonna leave it at stock for a few days till the thermal paste settles before i start to oc it.
 
Thanks guys, I upped the chip and it booted, ran prime for about 5 mins then when it changed to a different test I could hear the CPU screaming in a high pitched voice then it bombed with a prime error.

9x
400
spd 2 (800) 5-5-5-18
ddr v +0.2v
fsb +0.1
(g)mch +0.2v
cpu v 1.475

I can get it running at 3.4 quite nicely and at far lower voltages so I think I will just take a step back and be happy that I have squeezed a full 1GHz extra out of each core over and above what Intel wanted me to have, and with the lapping on the chip and cooler plus the size of the TRUE Im hopeful that the system will run quite nicely for at least a few years till I need something even quicker.

:)

Thanks for your advice, but alas Im chicken LOL
 
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