Upping Core Voltage, Why?

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DesireUnkind

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• Apr 17, 2003

• #1

I was wondering why people do this and what it does. I have a P4 2.4 @3.0 and yes I upped the voltage by .25. I did this because 3DMarks2003 kept dying about halfway thru and I had read about oc'ers upping the vcore. I figured .25 wasn't going to hurt anything.

Could someone explain to me what this does exactly, and why it must be done? I know I did it to make something run. Why I had to is another question, as is what it does exactly and how this affects the cpu. Does more FSB automatically equal the need for more power?

 

cack01

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• Apr 17, 2003

• #2

It is my understanding (and this is completly dumbed down), that the faster you run a signal, the more friction that signal will make, and thus you will lose signal strengh and get errors. Upping voltage helps "push" the signal and thus makes the cpu more stable.

 

The_Jizzler

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• Apr 17, 2003

• #3

yea, you up the Vcore when the cpu needs more power. the faseer it goes the more power it needs. like gas for a car sorta.... except in a cpu if you give it too much voltage it fries, and voltage alone wont make you go faster. i just usually up my Vcore when im unstable...ie.. ill be tweaking the puter, uppin the fsb and multiplier. i hit lets say,... 1.7 gigs at 1.65Vcore... then i up it too say 2ghz, but now im unstable/wont boot. so i up my voltage, little bumps at a time till i can boot and run stable, wash, rinse, repeat till desired overclock is achieved or unstable.

 

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Icem

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• Apr 17, 2003

• #4

my computer brings up errors and restarts even when i do all of that. I am running a GA-8IHXP Mobo, P4 2.4bGHz Processor, 1066RDRAM 768MB (Kingston), Gforce4 Ti 4400, 350 watt PSU, and i have watercooling and my temps are great. Wondering if anyone could help me out, i have posted everywhere and i cant solve my problem.

 

cack01

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• Apr 17, 2003

• #5

ICEM: Whats your FSB and memory running at??

 

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Icem

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• Apr 17, 2003

• #6

My fsb is running at default, and memory is running on auto, so everything is at default, if i oc it it either wont boot up right, or it brings up erros in the desktop, or it loads everything very slow.

 

cack01

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• Apr 17, 2003

• #7

If memory serves me right, PC1066 runs at 133MHz.

What speeds have you tried to run your FSB at.

Here is a list of what you would see:

 

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Icem

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• Apr 17, 2003

• #8

i do not see any of those in my bios, you have the same board as me? THE GA-8IHXP

 

Last edited: Apr 17, 2003

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DesireUnkind

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• Apr 17, 2003

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• #9

Thanks people for the explanation. I also learned something more. I was getting crashes in Quake3 when I was at 3.0 so I had knocked it down to 2.95 and all was well. After reading the reply(s) I decided to up the voltage by another .25 and raise my FSB back up to get 3.0 again. I played Q3 for over an hour last night and no errors. It'll take more time but I think it's stable.

I never thought about upping the voltage again until last nite. Thanks for the info!

 

M

Madboy2003

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• Apr 17, 2003

• #10

here is an article that explains it perfectly :

http://www.hardwareanalysis.com/content/article/1482.1

this is very important to know before messing with that kind of stuff!

 

OP

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DesireUnkind

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• Apr 17, 2003

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Madboy2003 said:

here is an article that explains it perfectly :

http://www.hardwareanalysis.com/content/article/1482.1

this is very important to know before messing with that kind of stuff!

Click to expand...

Excellent article. Thanks. : )

 

cack01

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• Apr 17, 2003

• #12

Man I was way off.

 

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menting

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• Apr 18, 2003

• #13

Actually, I dont think that article is entirely correct.
You do not have to reach Vcc for correct operation. There is only a threshold voltage that you have to reach before the signal is considered a "1", and below that threshold voltage it is considered a "0". When an output signal gets really close to the threshold voltage it can be either a "0" or a "1" depending on how skewed the next gate is. So you'd like the signals to be as close to the ground rail or the power rail as possible.

That's also why sometimes you can have undervolts, glitches in the power signal, etc and it can still operate fine. It is because all the signals are either way above the threshold voltage so it's a "strong 1" like my prof likes to put it, or way below such it is a "strong 0". It doesn't have to reach all the way to Vcc

 

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sttwindsurfer

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• Apr 20, 2003

• #14

ok i upped my fsb to 150 and also upped my vcore to 1.55 and when i boot windows it flashes blue for a millisecond. Is this due to instability or what? What programs will find instablility?