New to Overclocking and forum... Little guidance needed...

Hello all!

I am new here. First off I would like to say nice forum you have. Its very active as I can see.

I built me a new computer in the past few days. Everything went very well. It has been almost 10 years since I built my old one. Man what a difference it has made. i built this one to overclock but have no idea about what I am doing. Here is my rig specs:

Windows Vista Ultimate 32bit
Abit ip35 pro
Corsair Dominator 4Gig PC8500 w/fans
EVGA 512 8800GT 512M
PSU OCZ 700W
HD 500G WD 7K 16M SATA2
CPU INTEL E8400
Stock cooling fan for CPU for now

I have it all together and running good. Bios is updated to the latest and graphics as well. Vista has all updates too.

What I would like to know from you guys is what all settings in the bios do I need to adjust to get this computer running at its best? I have already overclocked the CPU to 3.6ghz. Tried playing a game and it keeps crashing and then I put it back at 3.0ghz and it never crashed. I have not adjusted any other settings in the bios. Voltages I do not really understand yet but I am catching on.

I am curious to know if my ram is running at its top performance. I really don't know how to tell. Maybe it needs to be adjusted in bios also?

I appreciate any help you guys can give me. Thanks

Wolfdale,

Set your CPU Vcore to 1.225 in the Bios. I think you will find your E8400 should run nicely at 3.6GHZ (9*400) at that voltage and actually you should be able to gradually pull down the voltage to something in the 1.18-1.20 range and still hit 3.6

3.6Ghz seems to be the tipping point as you go above 3.6 to 4 Ghz you will need a good bit more voltage.

Remember 1.3625 is maximum rated Vcore for the E8xxx series operation above this voltage can degrade your cpu longevity and performance. North of 1.45 you are in sudden death territory.

Its you CPU....you have to decide how far to push.


Also....make sure you are underclocking your ram your PC 8500 is 1066 ram...make sure you ram speed is something less than 1066. Shoot for something near 900mhz. Also make sure you ram voltage is set correctly you ram needs proper voltage. Check Cosairs site to get proper ram voltage.

You need to underclock your ram to make sure its not causing system instability as you nail down you cpu overclocking.

Monty_Python said:

Wolfdale,

Set your CPU Vcore to 1.225 in the Bios. I think you will find your E8400 should run nicely at 3.6GHZ (9*400) at that voltage and actually you should be able to gradually pull down the voltage to something in the 1.18-1.20 range and still hit 3.6

3.6Ghz seems to be the tipping point as you go above 3.6 to 4 Ghz you will need a good bit more voltage.

Remember 1.3625 is maximum rated Vcore for the E8xxx series operation above this voltage can degrade your cpu longevity and performance. North of 1.45 you are in sudden death territory.

Its you CPU....you have to decide how far to push.


Also....make sure you are underclocking your ram your PC 8500 is 1066 ram...make sure you ram speed is something less than 1066. Shoot for something near 900mhz. Also make sure you ram voltage is set correctly you ram needs proper voltage. Check Cosairs site to get proper ram voltage.

You need to underclock your ram to make sure its not causing system instability as you nail down you cpu overclocking.

Click to expand...

Monty_Python,

This is very helpful stuff your telling me. Thanks

I am a little confused as to why you would lower/underclock the performance of the RAM. It would seem to me like you want to get the most out of it that it offers. Please do explain this to me. Are you just saying I need to underclock it for testing purposes only?

Wolfdale,

Yes...I'm definately saying underclock your ram, you need to keep your ram slgihtly below its rated speed. It will just cause you headaches if you try to push the ram to its max speed.

Trust me on this keep your 1066 ram in the 850-975 Mhz range.

You will never notice the difference betwenn 900mhz and 1066 in games or normal use(you 'might" see a slight difference in benchmarking)

Monty_Python said:

Wolfdale,

Yes...I'm definately saying underclock your ram, you need to keep your ram slgihtly below its rated speed. It will just cause you headaches if you try to push the ram to its max speed.

Trust me on this keep your 1066 ram in the 850-975 Mhz range.

You will never notice the difference betwenn 900mhz and 1066 in games or normal use(you 'might" see a slight difference in benchmarking)

Click to expand...

Will do. Thanks again. If anyone can add any knowledge they may have that pertains to this thread, please do so by all means.

Monty_Python said:

Wolfdale,

Yes...I'm definately saying underclock your ram, you need to keep your ram slgihtly below its rated speed. It will just cause you headaches if you try to push the ram to its max speed.

Trust me on this keep your 1066 ram in the 850-975 Mhz range.

You will never notice the difference betwenn 900mhz and 1066 in games or normal use(you 'might" see a slight difference in benchmarking)

Click to expand...

Actually, what you will or may see is a difference in stability when pushing your fsb. I'm having to disagree and call this bad advice. You want to push your ram a bit to be able to get the same overclock with a lower multiplier and the only way to that is to raise the fsb and, in turn, memory speed. Run those suckers as fast as you safely can. Get a rock solid overclock with those 1066's, that's my advice.

lol....hmmmmm....Who ta listen to....Who ta listen to....

Im starting to get advice like I have been getting on how to clean my pool.

It was posted somewhere else on the forums as well, you will net better results with higher bus speed and lower multi even at the same overall speed because the bandwidth is increased. 500x8 for instance is faster than a 445x9 even though it's still 4.0Ghz The problem comes in when you increase the bus speed, the ram needs to also be increased. Fortunately, you have 1066's which will fare better than 800's. Don't be shy with them, you'll regret it if your going for a nice solid upper end overclock. I'm ditching my 800's for a set of 1066's so I can do the same.

Edit - Do not get too into Overclocking before upgrading that stock cooler though I may have missed it too, but what Mobo are you using? Edited the edit

OldSkool said:

It was posted somewhere else on the forums as well, you will net better results with higher bus speed and lower multi even at the same overall speed because the bandwidth is increased. 500x8 for instance is faster than a 445x9 even though it's still 4.0Ghz The problem comes in when you increase the bus speed, the ram needs to also be increased. Fortunately, you have 1066's which will fare better than 800's. Don't be shy with them, you'll regret it if your going for a nice solid upper end overclock. I'm ditching my 800's for a set of 1066's so I can do the same.

Edit - Do not get too into Overclocking before upgrading that stock cooler though I may have missed it too, but what Mobo are you using? Edited the edit

Click to expand...

I am using An Abit ip35 Pro Motherboard.

I have been messing around with uGuru which came install on the motherboard. It is accessed in the bios. I have not seen any setting/s for FSB adjustments. How do you adjust the FSB?

WolfDale said:

I am using An Abit ip35 Pro Motherboard.

I have been messing around with uGuru which came install on the motherboard. It is accessed in the bios. I have not seen any setting/s for FSB adjustments. How do you adjust the FSB?

Click to expand...

I haven't seen the Pro bios yet but if it has the same thing as the non-pro, it's in the softmenu, you just have to change the default settings to user defined and go from there. Make sure Numlock is on, it sounds silly, but it makes it easier, at least for me

Edit - Post a pic of your bios if you can, I'll be able to help you out more if I can see it.