Trying to restore my CPU overclock.

Malmortius

Malmortius

Malmortius

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16 Jun 2011
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Hi guys.
About 3-4 years ago i bought a pre-built PC pre-overclocked CPU from overclockers which still works great to this day.

Intel core i5 CPU 760 2.80 GHz 2.79 GHz overclocked to 3.9 GHz
4GB DDR3 RAM (Now 8GB)
HD6950 2gb
500w corsair PSU

It had 4gb and i added another 4gb 2 years ago which reset my overclock(stupid me!) I didn't realise that it would interfere with the overclock settings and restore to factory defaults.

When i tried to reapply the overclock a while ago (Restore optimal settings in bios) it did nothing. I tried it once before and it reapplied it, yet not this time.
I want to reapply the overclock so i can get a bit more performance on this ageing machine (And may buy a cheap GPU upgrade over my HD6950 in the future)

Any ideas on what i can do?
 
OhEsEcks said:
"Restore optimal settings" will simply restore the motherboard settings to their factory default which will be a safe default that allows everything to work. I don't know what the OCUK pre-builts were like that long ago, but they MIGHT have saved the overclock settings in a separate profile, if the motherboard allows different BIOS profiles. So you could try looking for BIOS profiles on your board.

If there's no BIOS profiles with a stored overclock, you will probably have to do the overclock yourself manually, which isn't that difficult and there's many on here who can help you with it.

What motherboard is in your machine?
Click to expand...

Motherboard is gigabyte p55-usb3 (thats what it says in system information, at least)

Im sure the last time i reloaded the overclocked profile, i used "optimized settings"
I would imagine "fail-safe settings" are the factory defaults.
 
forteh said:
I used the above guide to reapply a lost overclock on my ocuk i3 530 bundle. Originally it was at 4.02ghz which I pushed up to 4.62 without much hassle. Since upgraded to an i5 750 and taken it to 4.2 using the same guide. I was completely unfamiliar with overclocking these processors before and found the guide very well written and garnered great results :)

For reference I use 210 bclk, 20x multiplier with 1.3625vcore, 1.41vtt/qpi, 1.58vram, 1.3pch and 1.9pll ( if I've remembered that lot correctly). With all 4 ram slots populated it won't run above 200 bclk so limited to 8gb.
Click to expand...

Ok, after reading that guide, this is RIDICULOUSLY complicated. For someone who got a D in maths, this is torture.

There is no way im going to ever understand this. 2 years of trying to find someone to help me get my overclock back and its getting frustrating coming up with nothing. I understand its definitely a lot to ask for someone to go through it, people just dont have the time.
 
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forteh said:
I'll talk you through it best I can :)
What are your idle and load temperatures at stock clock speeds? Are you using stock cooling or aftermarket? What ram do you have and what speed is it rated at? Check the memory tab on cpuz and it should give you a table of speeds the ram is rated at; it should be 1333 or 1600mhz.
Let us know the above info and I'll start talking you through the bios settings :)

edit: if your local to Lichfield I'm happy to give you a hand:)
Click to expand...

Hi there. Im so appreciative of your help, man. Along with anyone else.

Righto. For cooling, the computer came with a H55 Hydro Corsair liquid cooler which i'm still using today.

Idle CPU temperatures are 35-45min - 51-53max idle on each core. (What are stock clock speeds? The speeds that come from the pc default optimized settings in bios?)
Load (As in when running a benchmark? i used novabench) At 100% load the highest core temps were 67c 67c 66c 66c

I have 8GB DDR3 ram. 2x4gb

In CPU-Z it says:
Size: 8192 MBytes
Channels # Dual
NB Frequency: 2120.4 MHz (fluctuates very slightly)
DRAM Frequency 663.2 MHz
 
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forteh said:
Cooling wise you shouldn't have too much issue as long as you airflow is ok and the rad isn't blocked with dust. The temps don't look too far out, obviously you needed to check on the constantly whilst you're setting up the overclock.

Check on the spd tab on cpuz, there should be a chart which lists the speeds and timings that the ram is capable of. The highest speed rated will be on the right hand side, as it's an ocuk overclocked bundle I'm guessing that it will probably be 1600mhz. Make a note of this and the numbers below it as you will need to put these into the bios later on.

The processor speed is determined by the baseclock (bclk) x cpu multiplier (multi). To overclock the cpu you increase the bclk until you are limited by either voltage, temperature or stability.

For example if you have a bclk of 200 and a multi of 20 you will have a 4ghz cpu (200x20=4000). The i5 760 has a stock bclk of 133 and multi of 21 giving a stock cpu speed of 2.793ghz (133x21=2793).

As you increase the speed of the bclk the ram speed also increases which can lead to instability because it can't overclock like the cpu can. You can force the ram to run slower by altering the ram multiplier. At default the ram multiplier (also called memory ratio) is set to 10 with a bclk of 133 giving a ram speed of 1333mhz. If you increase the bclk to 200 the ram would be forced to run at 2000mhz (200bclk x 10 ram multiplier) and will cause instability, to bring the memory speed back down to what it's rated for set a lower ram multiplier. For example setting a ram multiplier of 6 with a 200 bclk would give a ram speed of 1200 which is then below its rated speed of 1333 and will be stable. If you have faster rated ram you can set a higher ram divider to take advantage of the increased memory speed.

I've got to go out now but will update later on, in the mean time go have a look through the MIT section in your bios and get familiar with the different settings :)
Click to expand...

I'm starting to understand this a bit better now. Voltage is also important for overclocking, right.

I forgot to mention, this bundle came with 4gb RAM but i added another 4gb (Which actually reset factory defaults and reset my overclock) will that be a problem?
I see the max bandwidth is PC3-12800H (800MHz) so im guessing its 1600MHz (800x2)

Also, make a note of which numbers on the SPD tab? theres so many.
 
forteh said:
The additional sticks of ram can cause instability because the memory controller on the cpu has to work harder to drive all four sticks. With 2 sticks my memory controller is stable up to 219 bclk whereas with 4 sticks it won't go over 200 bclk. Not a major issue but needs to be considered when pushing overclock limits.

As you have 1600mhz ram, just record the spd timings for the 1600 column, these will be used when trying to determine the maximum speed the ram can run at.
Click to expand...

My ram is 2 sticks of 4gb.
I think originally it was 2x2gb, and i tried to add the other sticks and my pc bluescreened and reset the overclock. I removed the others and added my bought 2x4gb instead.
Also, dont i have 1333mhz ram? "DRAM Frequency 663.2 MHz"
 
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OhEsEcks said:
Your ram will appear as 1333 on your system unless you manually overclock it or set x.m.p to enabled in BIOS. My RAM for example runs at 1333 unless I clock it or enable x.m.p at which point it runs at 1866. Unless you bought 1333 in which case it'll run at 1333.
Click to expand...

ah right, i just checked my order history.

Crucial Ballistix Sport 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual
 
forteh said:
The ram will be running at stock speed for the cpu which is 1333, but the fact you have 1600 ram gives you more leeway and options for overclocks :)

Just about to start a 90 mile drive down to hereford in the snow so will update later :D
Click to expand...

Awesome, i cant wait to get all this upgrading done so i can run dragonage inquisition better :P Im holding off on playing it until then.
 
forteh said:
The additional sticks of ram can cause instability because the memory controller on the cpu has to work harder to drive all four sticks. With 2 sticks my memory controller is stable up to 219 bclk whereas with 4 sticks it won't go over 200 bclk. Not a major issue but needs to be considered when pushing overclock limits.

As you have 1600mhz ram, just record the spd timings for the 1600 column, these will be used when trying to determine the maximum speed the ram can run at.
Click to expand...

I may aswell just do this ;p

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freddie64 said:
Just had a look at the manual for your board.

When you first enter bios, press F12 to load CMOS from BIOS.

If there is a OCUK profile, it should be saved here.

If there is and it loads successfully, check the DRAM timings and volts, as you have changed the RAM.
Click to expand...

It doesnt seem to load. Theres a profile called "ocuk" but when i choose it, nothing changes.
 
wazza300 said:
for 3.9ghz oc

set bclk to 186
set cpu multi to 21x
set memory multi to 8x
set uncore frequency to 16x

idk what motherboard you have but gigabyte set qpi/vtt voltage to 1.35v,(dram vtt if asus)

set dram voltage to what your ram is usually 1.66v (1.65v in windows)

set cpu voltage to normal (offset if asus)

then try +0.0500v dvid(offset if asus) (may be able to lower later)

then see what the load (while stressing cpu/cpu voltage is) use prime95 and use cpu-z to see load cpu voltage

enable all powersaving in bios apart from c1e,disable that
Click to expand...

Hey i had a look at all these settings, i couldn't change the DVID, it had an X next to it and no option to enable me to change it. Its on optimised right now so i dont fry my pc or anything, so ill wait until i have a bit more info from you.

Also, i couldnt find the powersaving options in the bios, or anything about c1e.
 
wazza300 said:
Yeah you have to first scroll through CPU voltage till you see normal,once you set to that it unlocks dvid for adjustment

C1e should be in there somewhere,just enable eist,or load optimised defaults and re enter all the other oc settings,the rest will be enabled by default (powersaving ect)
Click to expand...

This is probably going to P off those of you who were kind enough to help, but i was able to activate my ocuk overclock.. i pressed enter on the profile twice and it worked. Wow, i forgot the difference between 2.9 and 3.9... DA inquisition seems to be running much better, unless its just a placebo effect (is it?)

The temps were around 65-75 consistently when the cpu load was 80%-100%

My only worry now is, my original overclock was optimized for 4GB, so will i have to change anything right now since im using 8GB ram?
 
Ronald said:
If it is stable, no. Sounds like the memory you bought has more headroom than your old 4GB so I wouldn't be too suprised if it is stable as you have it now.

Initially I assumed you added memory to reach 8GB, rather than replace your original 4GB, which would be a bit more difficult to stabilize.
Click to expand...

I originally added the ram to make 12gb i think, but it caused bluescreen. I took out my old 2x2gb ram and placed in 2x4gb

wazza300 said:
Only thing I'd check is qpi/vtt voltage,you might need around 1.32v with 8gb of ram
Click to expand...

Might, or will?
 
Ronald said:
Did the 12GB run on the OCUK profile at all, or only after the bios reset itself?

It would be unfortunate, but not unheard of to not be stable at stock speeds with such different memory modules.
Click to expand...

i don't think it did. The overclock reset and the pc went to defaults when it bluescreened after putting in the ram. I think it might have been because i had in 3 sticks of ram? which ive heard is bad.

How will i know if its unstable, random crashes?
 
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wazza300 said:
It just let's the CPU use less than 1v at idle,if stressed it uses full voltage

You have a default CPU voltage set by Intel,each chip is unique in how much default voltage it uses,dvid (dynamic vcore) adds what you set in it needed for stability ontop of the default voltage

So say you have 1.2v default and you set +0.0500v in dvid this would give you 1.25v CPU voltage at load and allow CPU to idle at 1v
Click to expand...

Oh, that makes sense.

QPI/VTT was on 1.00(Auto?), i put it to 1.31v (it was either 1.31 or 1.33)
 
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