7dxr: core voltage wierdness

i was playing around in my bios and set my voltage down to 1.775 (it was on default). later when looking at my mbm5 screen i noticed that it reported my core voltage at 1.85.

i thought that was wierd, went back to bios and bumped it up to 1.825, mbm5 (and another bios screen actually) then reported 1.89

is this strange or do i just not understand what the voltage i'm allowed to set does?

i've tried oc'ing and can only get ~ an extra 100MHz out of my 1.4 t-bird with the bios voltage set to 1.85. anything beyond this wont post, and even this is not usually stable even using my ax-7 w/ tornado at full speed.
is the board in general not good for oc'ing? should i be setting my voltage by switch instead of in bios?

edit: heh, just now learned that 'stepping' means the string of chars or the cpu die (right?), i have no idea, but will find out as soon as i can locate that stupid little pack of silicone grease again.

I don't know much about your mobo but I can say that your speed is about the usual OC for that processor, I would need to know what your stepping is to tell you anything about your chip. I can tell you that the voltage problem that your witnesing isn't unusual nor a bad thing, those chips usually like as much power as they can get. On my ASUS board, I can set the Vcore to 1.85 and I usually get 1.9*, not a bad thing unless it gets too hot.

thats dissapointing news..., i was hoping that when i finally got my cooling gear finished i'd be able to go higher. i'd have even replaced the mobo if it was holding me back.
btw, xteq is telling me "x86 Family 6 Model 4 Stepping 4", i dont have cpuid right now.

temps are a problem right now. cpu is 70c as i type this. the temp is mostly due to a 30c+ room and poor thermal paste, but theres nothing i can do right now.

70C holy cow... Personally I never like my chip above 50C, Is your machine actually stable at that temt? Unless you get a better heatsink, I don't think you will be able to go much further without roasting that chip.

What chipset do you have, If you have a decent chipset, You should try to raise your FSB as much as posible, and lower the multi the keep the chip stable, for example: you might be able to lower your multi to 9 and try to get 166FSB and 1494core.

yeah, i've got really crappy thermal paste on there right now (my ax-7 /w tornado). 70c is while folding, with the fan at 7v and room temp at 30c. right now folding with room temp at 24c my temp is 62c. and yes, strangely enough i'm completely stable.

i'm not sure how well i can answer about my chipset, all i know is that its via. my mobo manual has 'amd 761+686B AGPset' on the cover. does that mean anything?

whenever i try anything over 146 (i think) my comp wont even post, no matter what voltage i choose in bios. i may try again using the board switches, since the bios choices dont seem to change much.

edit: btw, when i say crappy thermal paste, i mean i was getting 10-15° better temps with just silicone grease.