overclocking starter :(

[seb500]

Hi

Read the overclocking guide but still a bit confused, could someone whos experienced tell me what to do so I can understand it a little more please

My PC:

Q6600
OCZ 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C8 1600MHz
ASRock P45DE3
HIS 4870X2
OCZ StealthXStream 2 500W
CoolIT Eco A.L.C. 120mm CPU Watercooler

Ideas ;D?

 

[evil_yo]

yes, i like to know more myself, as OP stated.. it is a little confusing when reading the threads

 

[Blue160]

Ok, here's a way to get started This works for Q6600 and other Core2 CPU's

First knock your RAM speed as low as possible to take that out of the equation.

You can then start raising the FSB (Front Side Bus) frequency. This raises the speed of everything attached to the motherboard. Raise by a small amount, then boot into Windows and run Prime95 to check stability. Rinse and repeat till you start getting instability.

Use CPUz to check what overclock you are getting.

At that point you can either back off a bit and be happy with the overclock you have at stock volts, or start raising the CPU voltage to help stability and go even higher.

Hope that helps

Go slow and carefull, and keep an eye on temperature at all times.

 

[belial8321]

Good info as blue stated above;
If you are willing to push your overclock a little higher, overvolting is necessary - never push it too high though (check your cpu's max vcore on manufacturer site and stay well clear of that as a beginner)
Cpu vcore can indeed increase stability, increasing cpu/nb voltage is another stability boost, as is dram voltage in some cases.

Also easy overclocked are obtained by lowering your multiplier (probably on 14X for most modern cpu's) and raising your FSB speed.

Good luck, feel free to ask more questions

 

[belial8321]

Oh and watch your temps if your on air! XD

 

[belial8321]

And also, is your ram currently running at its 1600mhz clock speed? ram latency tweaking can offer massive improvements i've found if you spend some time researching and fiddling, EXPECT LOTS OF BSODS WITH RAM OVERCLOCKING!

 

[j.col]

this is a very basic explanation of overclocking

its basic maths. your Q6600 is rated at 1066mhz. you always divide this number by 4 so 1066/4= 266, this is your fsb.(maybe be called cpu frequency)
then your processor (cpu) has a multiplier of 9 (maybe be called cpu ratio)
so 266 x 9 = 2394mhz or 2.4GHz, your stock speed

unlink your ram, so it stays at stock speeds, you can overclock the ram later

can you raise the fsb? yours is now 266. try rising it to 280
boot into windows
download realtemp and coretemp (google them)
install and run them
then download intel burn test (ibt) and run it.
have a look in task manager and notice how much free ram is listed.

in ibt set threads to 4 (for 4 cores) and then click on custom ram and enter an amount just below the free amount.
eg. i have 2520mb free ram. so i enter 2500 into the custom ram.
run the test for 5 passes. for now,
and then at final speed you want, run for 50 passes
keep an eye on temps (do not let it go over 75.c)
also you should have in the result, about 30-35gflops at 3ghz
and 35-40gflops at 3.4ghz

if test runs fine, go back into bios, and change frequency (fsb) to 300 and repeat the tests.
keep doing this in 20mhz steps until windows will not boot. then just go back a step (remove 20 from the fsb) to the last stable frequency,
or
just raise the cpu voltage a couple of levels. it should now boot.
its a balancing act, higher voltages will get you higher fsb, but it will also give you higher temps.
my B3 revision Q6600 needs 1.39v in the bios to get to 3.3ghz.
if yours is a G0 revision, you should be able to get this speed at a lower voltage


the trick is to do this step by step, and not go straight to eg. 400 (400 x 9= 3.6ghz), just take your time.

also for some reason using the x9 multi, i couldn't get past 3.0ghz
so i dropped it to a x8 multi and i got it to 3.3ghz easily.

the only thing stopping me is my temps, i hit mid 70's.C in IBT.

max vcore for the q6600 is 1.5v for 24hr use (but i have seen some with 1.6v)
also dont let it go higher than 75-78.C in stress testing

get the cpu maxed before increasing the ram speed

 

[seb500]

Thanks dude, going to experiment when I get my new case + fans. As I have a water cooler, do you think I could get 4GHz out of it?

 

[Blue160]

4GHz is a lot for a Q6600. Just go slowly and see how far you get. Don't set yourself a target to start with. Going for really high overclocks straight away is a recipe for frying something.