Overclocking my i7 2600

[mxoagentjohnson]

Hey guys.

So from what i have heard, you can overclock the i7 2600, but apparently it is limited? Up to 4.1 ghz is what i heard.

At the moment i run the stock cooler (I know, for shame) but i've never really overclocked anything before.

I was thinking of getting a good new cpu fan as i really need one and overclocking to 4.1ghz. as recently i believe my cpu is bottlenecking my gpu (680 power edition) at times (Noticed in games like bf3, tomb raider and crysis that i dont hit solid 60 all the time, for crysis i just lower two settings, for tomb raider its odd and for bf3 multiplayers a struggle on some maps hitting 40's in areas constantly)

Can anyone suggest a good CPU cooler to go into a Zalman Z9 case? I can get my motherboard info too

And will overclocking/getting a better cooler help with getting the wanted fps? (My cpu gets th hottest of all my components at 75 under load)

MAny thanks!

 

[mxoagentjohnson]

Just gonna post the CPU fan i was considering and the thermal paste

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HS-020-AL

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=TH-002-AK

Was gonna get these to replace my stock cooler as i hit high temps and wanna oc so i can ultra most things!

 

[AgedIdiot]

Each chip has its own limit- yours may well do better than 4.1 BUT could do worse !

Your motherboards abilities are key to getting the best clock and control the volts etc - what board are you running?

( I would mention that so far as I am aware i2600k chips are not limited to 4.1 - it may be that the benefits of a higher clock are outweighed by the volts needed/heat produced ; but I do not know of any such limit being auto applied by either chip or board)

Cooler wise - I am a convert to the Corsair Hydro series (and other equivalents) as for the same price as the Alpenfohn you have a cooler which cools (just?) as well but takes up a lot less space and comes with pre-applied paste

(Am running a i2700k myself - was at 4.4 when using a corsair h60 (1st edition) but recently moved to a full w.c. loop so have upped the clock to 4.5 AND I am sure that there is much more available !)

NB - I assume that we are talking about a 2600K chip and not a vanilla 2600 - if you have the non-k chip then clocking is , unless things have changed , damn near impossible AND you should ignore the comments made by me above.

 

[Digit]

It is possible to OC the locked 2600 chip. But only slightly.

I have one myself and have all cores sat at 3.5GHz constantly via the Turbo Key II switch on my motherboard. It also OC my memory slightly as well. This basically ups the BCLK to 103.0 from a standard 100.0 frequency. I believe a maximum of 105.0 can be used but have not tried it myself.

If it was possible to get up to 4.1GHz i would be very interested to know how but i doubt it.