Overclock...what overclock

HatMan

HatMan

HatMan

Associate
Joined
2 Oct 2007
Posts
610
Location
Cardiff
Hi All,

I feel sure the moaning people post regarding overclocking issues are nothing new here. Having said that, I find myself in a frustrating loop of desperation and bewilderment as I for the life of me, an amateur, cannot OC my PC.

I have a Q6600 B3 :( , a GA-P35-DQ6 mobo, and four sticks of 1Gb XMS 6400C4, an Enermax 720w PSU and a Freezer 7 running Vista Premium 64. Having read some tutorials, most of which flew over my head, I have more or less given up to the fact that "I" couldn't overclock ****.

Whatever I do I get either........

  1. An endless startup NO POST loop
  2. A few restarts then a BSOD
  3. A few restarts and Vista loads, then a BSOD
  4. A few restarts then a reset then a normal start, all will be well.

I can underclock the CPU no problem.

Are there some settings I can enter from known working systems with my components I can enter? All I want is 3GHz 100% stable. Not much to ask considering I have read reports of 3.5GHz and 4.1GHz stable on air and PC respectively.

Before I drive all the way to OCuk with my rig, I figured you guys may be able to sort me out.

Thanks
 
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Hi and welcome :)

Have you dropped the memory multiplier to x2.0 and set the memory to its correct voltage?
 
4 sticks, at a guess pump in a little more than rated juice, and maybe drop timings, if rated say 4,4,4,15, try 5,5,5,18 and overclock, drop the multiplier, lock the pci-e bus to 101 mhz for now. first off, stock settings go into windows, install the gigabyte bios app, flash to a newer bios. i can't recall if i flashed a new one, on f4 at the mo i think, i'm about to flash to hopefully get some better overclocking and hopefully different spd settings. using memset the performance setting is at 9 on this bios/board, its often at 4 or 6 on asus boards, i can set to 6 while overclocked and see a pretty big boost in performance just from that but i can't set it from bios so hopefully a different bios will have a different setting. if you want to benchmark anything download memset and change a couple settings.

give everything a tiny bit more voltage to start with, also, something bigger/better than a freezer 7 might be warranted for the quad core. i'm using water and can get my B3 up to 3.8GHz for benching no probs, 3.6Ghz utterly stable daily usage.
 
Ace, quick replies, thank you. Um I do not see a RAM multiplier at all I am using bios F6. Regarding cooling I had thought to change to a Swiftech H20 120 (Stock Code: WC-028-SW) if necassary.. I understand the numbers for the RAM refer to timings but they are not displays like that in the bios????
 
You will need to press ctrl+F1 in the main BIOS screen to see the advanced options like multi...

Boot up into the BIOS and press control+F1 then (assuming your BIOS options are similiar to mine)

Go to Advanced BIOS Features and change:

CPU Enhanced Halt (C1E): Disabled
CPU Thermal Monitor 2(TM2): Disabled

Then go back to the main screen and enter the MB Intelligent Tweaker(M.I.T.)

CPU Clock Ratio: 9
CPU Host Clock Control: Enabled
CPU Host Frequency: 334
PCI Express Frequency: 101
C.I.A.2: Disabled
System Memory Multiplier: 2.00
DRAM Timing Selectable: Manual
CAS: 4
RAS 2 CAS: 4
RAS Precharge: 4
tRAS: 15 (I find 15 works better than 12 when using 4 sticks you can lower it later if it works at 15)

Set all the rest of the RAM timings to Auto

System Voltage Control: Manual
DDR2 OverclockVoltage Control: +0.4 (yes it will be highlighted as dangerous but don't worry :D)
PCI-E OverVoltage Control: +0.1
FSB OverVoltage Control: +0.1
G(MSC) OverVoltage Control: +0.1
CPU Overvoltage Control: 1.4625 (to allow for the vdroop) NOTE: See what the default is in the BIOS entry below this one... if its 1.3125 then go with 1.4625 if its 1.2ish then you might want to leave this setting on auto - if in doubt leave it on auto.

save up and reboot and it should work... then run it through memtest86 a few cycles to make sure RAM is fine and then boot into windows for a few hours or orthos and you should be set.

If it still doesn't work try setting those RAM timings to 5-5-5-18 instead of 4-4-4-15 as someone said above.

Oh once you have got it running get everest running with the sensor window open while running orthos and make sure the vcore is actually drooping from whats set in the BIOS - you don't need 1.4625 (actual) to run a Q6600 at 3gig stable should your vdroop be less than mine.
 
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Hmm would help to know what your default VCore actually is on that Q6600 some of them are 1.3125 but others apparently only 1.25 - the difference would make a lot of odds in terms of heat if not adjusted correctly.
 
Have set everything as shown, thank you!!! Would not start. Set RAM to stock 5,5,5,18 and it booted fine and shows 3.0GHz. Ran Orthos but it BSOD after 20secs.
 
See if you can get it stable with only 2 RAM sticks intstead of 4 - 4 sticks is a lot trickier to work with...
 
Hi All,

First off thanks for the help. Right with the settings as shown above my PC has started and is running at 3GHz. I ran Orthos and it failed after 20secs. So I changed the RAM timings to 4,4,4,15 and it ran Orthos until I'd had enough and needed to sleep. This morning when I started the PC it went into an endless loop again. After a few presses of the reset button it fired up @ 3GHz. The PC is certainly not stable yet, but I wouldn't expect it to be that simple.

Rroff, why would two sticks be more stable than four? It's matched RAM. If I had to swap to 2 x 2Gb sticks I would go back to stock speeds as I cannot afford to dump £180 worth of RAM in favour of a pair of 2Gb.

What do I need to do next? Once again thank you.
 
What temp monitoring software is good with Vista? Coretemp does not run under 64bit (for me) and Speedfan seems to be making up the information. For example my 12v rail reads 1.92v and my -12v rail reads -16.99v, the -5v rail read -8.07v. Two temps have minus values. The cores are all at 46c at idle.
 
The problem is most likely your Vcore (CPU voltage). Increase it in small increments (0.025 at a time). 1.325v on a 3ghz overclock for a B3 quad is a little low. 1.4 seems more realistic tbh.
 
what voltage is your ram, auto or set to stated voltage ? this could help if not @ rated volts. have u memtested the ram at all?
would go with previous statement, try running it with just 2x sticks & see if can run stable.
dont be shy to up the the voltage on cpu, mem ect a little, could be just the push it is needing. g/l
 
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