Need help O/C'ing a x6800 Please Help!

Hello all, I'm pretty new to the OC'ing scene and these forums. These forums rock btw, and many helpful people here who are very knowledgable.

I read a lot of guides on how to overclock, I think the issue with me is I don't really understand the fsb:ram ratio thing. I was wondering if anyone who has similar parts to me can assist me with settings in Bios I can change to help me overclock to the highest clock, and keep a 1:1 fsb:ram ratio.

Here are my computer spec.

1. ASUS P5W DH DELUXE/WIFI-AP Socket T (LGA 775) Intel 975X ATX Intel Motherboard
2. Intel Core 2 Extreme X6800 Conroe 2.93GHz LGA 775 Processor
3. ATI Radeon X1950 CrossFire Edition 512MB GDDR4 PCI Express x16 CrossFire Video Card
4. ATI Radeon X1950 CrossFire 512MB GDDR4 PCI Express x16 CrossFire Video Card
5. OCZ GameXStream OCZ700GXSSLI ATX12V 700W Power Supply
6. x2 CORSAIR XMS2 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory
7. Creative SOUND BLASTER X-Fi Platinum 7.1 Channels PCI Interface Sound Card
8. Lian Li PC75 Black Computer Case
9. 2 WD Raptor drives 80gb Raid 0
10. Pioneer DvD burner
11. Innovatek Watercooling

P.S my computer won't recognize my 4GB of ram, does anyone know why? It only shows up as 2GB, and PC 5400 instead of 6400.

holy smokes, that is a monster PC you have there. i'm not to up on the p5w-dh, so i'm sure others can give you a better understanding of the BIOS settings, but the basics apply to all mobos.

first, you are going to want to disable all cpu "features". this is power saving stuff that you don't want or need.

then, make sure your pci-e is set to 101mhz, and pci is locked to 33.33mhz.

what you are going to want to do is isolate the CPU and find out the max it will do. use a high multiplier for this, say 11x. that way, your ram and mobo aren't going to be a wall and you can see what the cpu can really do. you will want to raise the fsb in small increments, and test along the way. the best test to give you a quick idea of stability is pcmark available at www.futuremark.com. if you can pass all tests, most likely you will be stable in everything else. when you settle on an OC, you will use something a bit more strenuous, like Orthos, but you will want to run that for at least 12hours to really see if its stable, and we have no time for that for every little increase we make.

increase the fsb say 5mhz at a time untill you get an error in pcmark, then raise the vcore one notch, and try again. if it passes, start raising the fsb again untill you get another error. keep repeating this process untill you reach a vcore that you are comfortable with. you will start to see diminishing returns, so there will come a time when it just isn't worth throwing more vcore at it for minimal gains. i would say stick to 1.55v in bios for now, that should give you around 1.5v actual.

give it a shot and report back to us. after you find out what the cpu can do with your cooling, we can start working on the ram and mobo. once the limits of the ram and mobo are found, then you pick an apporpriate multi that will max out your ram, fsb, and cpu all together.

The 4GB of ram issue is a 32bit-XP memory addressing issue and it doesn't have anything to do with overclocking really. I would consentrate on finding the limits of the hardware first then look into doing what you can to use your ram.. Ill go look up a link that has alot of info but its a system file tweak last time I looked.

If you went with 64bit-XP the 4GB of ram wouldn't be a problem btw but you might have some hardware that would have driver issues, check to make sure there are drivers for your hardware before making the choice to moving to that OS.

I'm going to say stick with HBB's advice so far

Thanks for the replies guys.

So far what I've tried yesterday, is that my CPU can boot and load windows and complete 3Dmark06 @ 3.8 GHZ with no issues. I don't have any games installed to try them out on. I got a poor score in 3DMark06 because of my Ram I think. I believe my FSB:RAM ratio was at 4:3 something wierd. I had the vcore at 1.6, water cooling was handling it fine, I think it reached 56c. I don't know if it might have been the cards causing the low 3dmark score, cause I know the catalyst 6.10 haven't been officially released. Right now I got the Beta, and it is letting me run crossfire to my knowledge. I took out 2 GB or ram and am just using 2 GB atm. I'm sure my cpu can get past 4 GHZ stable.

ATM im interested in what I can get my computer to with the 1:1 ratio, write all the information down, and leave it at stock speeds until my new Innovatek set arrives, getting the G-flow block, new Dual Rad, new Resivor, chipset waterblock, and 2 WB for the ATI cards, and new pump.

Once I get the new set, lap the processor and blocks, I'll go for max speeds. Any help is greatly appreciated.

Here is the Ram issue link I said I would dig up for ya.
http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=475868

Thanks for the link, some cool info on it.

Holy crap that was a lot of confusing stuff, I think I'll stick with 2gigs until someone decides to fix their OP, or wait for Vista which I hear will work with the 4 GB.

64bit versions of windows can handle 4GB and more.

btw.. your CPU frequency overclock looks about right for the Vcore you used.

Here is a link to my CPUZ verification for when I got it to 3.5 ghz, speed is great but it is my fsb:ram ratio and probably timmings that are off.

http://valid.x86-secret.com/show_oc?id=132867

http://valid.x86-secret.com/show_oc?id=133135

3.5 GHZ with 1:1 ratio 4.4.4.12 Woot! May not be the best, but I think I am understanding now. Anymore tips guys?

You could test the limits of the NB.

Dropping the multi down to 6, and testing your ram with Memtest to see how far the FSB can go.

New water cooling equipment ordered, going to go for 4ghz + to join the 4ghz club.

Going for 4 GHZ tonight, wish me luck

Fathom18 said:

Going for 4 GHZ tonight, wish me luck

Click to expand...

Good luck
And, get to clockin'