Overclocking E7200 Wolfdale

Edit: Please see latest posts for most recent information

It's pretty sad I've been here for 6 years and don't know how to overclock

Well...that's not fully true. I've overclocked a few times in the past with a few different CPUs. But, most of those were long ago, and different CPUs. Anyways, a combination of forgetting all the steps of overclocking and being on a dual core system has got me a little lost. Luckily the guide up top has rehashed my memory pretty well. I'm not so great at following guides though, I do better just talking to other people who know about this stuff. Please see my signature for all my system info.

Let's see if I got this right (I'm quite certain I don't). Rather, let's see if I get anything right:

1. Enter the bios

2. Up the FSB/CPU frequency to 333 (or maybe 533 since my ram is DDR2 1066? That's what it says in the sticky but it seems like it'd be hard to multiply that...)

3. Gradually raise the speed of my CPU by 100/200 mhz

4. Boot into Windows and run Prime95 to test the stability (how long does the Prime95 test take anyways? We talking minutes or hours?)

5. If stable, increase the speed by another 100/200 mhz

6. Repeat until it's not stable and take a step back

7. And I'm finished!

Can ya tell I haven't been here for a while?

So, how much of that is wrong? Kinda forgot about the RAM, need to change the timings of that too, correct?

Never overclocked a dual core CPU before. Also I'm in 64 bit Vista now, which shouldn't matter to much.

Had this system for a while now and it's been working great. Stability is a top concern. Surprisingly this is probably the coolest system I've ever had and I made no changes to the Cooling from my last 2 or 3 systems. PC wizard says processor temp is 40C right now, but also says Processor 1 is 34C and 2 is also 34C. I'm a little worried about my (probably) less than mediocre PSU. I think it's 500W, but not a great name brand. Voltages look good right now though.

Sorry about all the blabbering.

Welcome back. You're on the right track but heres a few pointers. You are correct in slowly raising the FSB from 333, but only raise it by 3-5 mhz at a time, not 100-200. As you raise your FSB, you will likely have to change you RAM ratio to keep it from going over 1066 (unless you want to OC your ram too, but I usually leave that for last).

Prime95 kinda got reincarnated into ORTHOS, its what most people use. Keep taking notes and stress testing with each speed bump. Soon enough you'll have to start upping the voltage to the cpu, and the NB and other mobo components as well.

You've got a great system (vid card is a bit weak, why not buy my 4870 in the classifieds? ) let us know how it goes and post back! Cool avatar btw.

Heya, thanks for the reply/info. Yeah after looking around for a long while I didn't see many people using Prime95 anymore. Will check out ORTHOS.

nightelph said:

You've got a great system (vid card is a bit weak, why not buy my 4870 in the classifieds? ) let us know how it goes and post back! Cool avatar btw.

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Yeah it is a good system, pretty recently put together (sometime in the last 6 months). Think I'll ride this vid card until it's dead, it still gets the job done. Nice that video cards are much cheaper than they used to be though (for the most part anyhow). I loves me some 'puter hardware classifieds though so maybe I'll give it a look-see.

nightelph said:

Cool avatar btw.

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Thanks - Gotta love Reynold

I use P95. I don't think Orthos is set up for quads, while P95 has been getting updated pretty regularly...it really doesn't matter, though.

Make sure you get your RAM loosened up before you start messing w/ the FSB. Drop the mem ratio to 1:1, and set the RAM voltage to what your RAM is spec'd for. Loosen the main timings to 5-5-5-18. After you get your FSB/CPU stable at a good speed you can go back and tweak out the RAM.

I'm probably going to see how far I can get with everything at stock voltage first. So should I still loosen the memory timings to 5-5-5-18? What are my RAM timings by default and what would be considered a good OC for the ram? Thanks.

Welp I tried some overclocking just now and it didn't go too well. I'm always kinda overwhelmed by all the different options.

First I set the memory timings to 5-5-5-18, they were already like that, but they were on auto instead. Then I looked for an option like "Memory Ratio" but couldn't find anything. Then I set the multiplier to 8, instead of 8.5 and bumped up the fsb a couple to 335 (think it was like 2.66 ghz). Saved and exited the bios and then my computer went off right away, then tried to come back on, then went off again right away, and it did this about 3 times. So I manually shut it down and booted back up and it showed the CPU at 2.13 ghz or something like that. I went into the bios again and most of the settings were back to what they were before I tampered with em. I'm guessing this is some kind of feature of the motherboard where if it doesn't boot up right it sets the settings back. The only thing it didn't reset was the multiplier, which is why it showed the cpu at 2.13. Normally the multiplier is 8.5 so when I set it back to that the CPU ran at the correct speed.

Bios gave me some warnings that I should turn Voltage to Auto if overclocking so I did that and tried again. It did the same thing where it kept turning off and on.

So I likely did something wrong - Any ideas? Looking forward to giving it another try.

Adaman said:

Bios gave me some warnings that I should turn Voltage to Auto if overclocking so I did that and tried again. It did the same thing where it kept turning off and on.

So I likely did something wrong - Any ideas? Looking forward to giving it another try.

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The voltage might be OK at default for your CPU, but I doubt they're correct at default for your ram. My board defaults my vram to 1.8v, when it needs 2.1v to run at default spec.

Adaman said:

I'm probably going to see how far I can get with everything at stock voltage first. So should I still loosen the memory timings to 5-5-5-18? What are my RAM timings by default and what would be considered a good OC for the ram? Thanks.

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Adaman said:

Welp I tried some overclocking just now and it didn't go too well. I'm always kinda overwhelmed by all the different options.

First I set the memory timings to 5-5-5-18, they were already like that, but they were on auto instead. Then I looked for an option like "Memory Ratio" but couldn't find anything. Then I set the multiplier to 8, instead of 8.5 and bumped up the fsb a couple to 335 (think it was like 2.66 ghz). Saved and exited the bios and then my computer went off right away, then tried to come back on, then went off again right away, and it did this about 3 times. So I manually shut it down and booted back up and it showed the CPU at 2.13 ghz or something like that. I went into the bios again and most of the settings were back to what they were before I tampered with em. I'm guessing this is some kind of feature of the motherboard where if it doesn't boot up right it sets the settings back. The only thing it didn't reset was the multiplier, which is why it showed the cpu at 2.13. Normally the multiplier is 8.5 so when I set it back to that the CPU ran at the correct speed.

Bios gave me some warnings that I should turn Voltage to Auto if overclocking so I did that and tried again. It did the same thing where it kept turning off and on.

So I likely did something wrong - Any ideas? Looking forward to giving it another try.

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Doing what I said above should help immensely. I was giving you general advice that should be taken before anyone starts to OC...not fine-tune tweaking that will give you that last 100MHz or kill your system in the process.

RAM voltage is a key point most people miss, and you even dismissed it thinking it wasn't relevant. Your RAM has a rating, and it corresponds to a particular voltage setting. By default all DDR2 mobos set the RAM to 1.8v. You need to manually increase this to the spec of your RAM (it should be 2.0+). On your board you'll have to set it to +0.2v or +0.3v as it doesn't show absolute values.

The option for RAM dividers should have options like: 2.0, 2.5, 2.4, 3.0, 4.0, etc. 2.0 corresponds to 1:1, and that is what you should set for now.

Don't worry about the final RAM OC yet. Once you get the CPU/FSB where you want it you will be able to make a better decision about the best speed/timings to run the RAM.

Thanks again, jason4207.

I set the "System Memory Multiplier" to 2.0, which I guess is the same as "Ram dividers". Also it appeared that my memory was actually running at the spec'd voltage by default, but I'm not sure. In the bios listed under 'DDR18V' it showed a little under 2.1v which is the voltage my memory is spec'd at. For the first OC I'm trying 8.5X 300 which is 2550mhz. CPU-Z shows it keeps dropping to 1800mhz, is that normal for dual core or is there some kind of power saving option somewhere I should probably disable?

Guess I'll run some kind of stability test now. Using Prime95 I don't really know what I'm doing. Should I just select 'Blend' mode under Torture Test? I guess the recommended run time is 24 hours, but that's too long for me. I'll try and do 4 hour Prime95 runs...that seems more reasonable even though it may not be as thorough as a 24 hour test.

Edit: Also, someone recommended I try a 6.5x533mhz overclock. If I were to do that, what would I do with the RAM settings? I'm still confused as to how memory plays a part in overclocking. Would I keep the ram dividers at 2.0 of I were to try 6.5x533fsb? Was also recommended to use 1.2v for my CPU if I were to try that OC...would that be in the safe range?

So, by default my memory runs at 5-5-5-18...what would it be if it were overclocked or underclocked? Do ram dividers change the 5-5-5-18 numbers? Like I said I pretty much get the CPU part of overclocking but still confused as to how the memory part works. *goes to read more*

edit: Tried some more overclocking but system wouldn't boot at 6.5x533 or 6x533, that was with 1.2 vcore and mem divider (or system memory multiplier) at 2.0. So I don't know why it wouldn't boot up, but there's probably at least 3 reasons - Really need some guidance with this.

At 533 you are hammering your NB. Unless you juice that up as well you aren't going to get any stability.

My suggestion is to set voltage to whatever you are comfortable with (Say 1.25 or 1.3V)

Make sure your RAM is set to it's proper voltage (2.0-2.2V probably)

From there slowly up the speed, and stick with the 9 multi until you reach a point where you can't OC further.

Then try the 8.5 multi and 8 multi to see if the lower multiplier can give you extra stability.

Ok, thanks.

Trying to think of what "NB" is but all that keeps coming to mind is New Balance. I'm still tired - Anyone wanna give me a hint?

North Bridge.

altoid said:

North Bridge.

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Good hint. Thanks

Well I tried a little more OC'in and didn't have much luck. Doesn't help that I'm probably doing it wrong. Got it to boot up at 3.19ghz with a 1.25 vcore. I think I had it at 9.5x333 with a ram divider or 3.33 (it came out to 1066). Computer quickly crashed after bootup though. So then I tried 2.9 ghz or something and it went right into a BSOD. I'm a little cautious to use 1.3 voltage for my CPU. Think it'd be ok?

I'm a pretty anal OCer. Just a suggestion.

1st thing I do is back every voltage down as low as I can go at default clockspeed to see where all my minimum values. Doing that allows me to know where my starting points are for everything.

2nd I drop my multi as low as it goes and find what my max FSB is.
After I have found my lows and highs I start my OC.

Leave your RAM dividers at 1:1. I can't stress this enough. Don't try OCing while ram is at 2:1. You will save yourself many unnecessary headaches. Overclocking RAM beyond 1:1 RARELY if ever gains you anything anyway... If you really feel unfulfilled leaving extra RAM headroom on the table rais it up AFTER you have gotten your max stable OC.

GL.

Thanks.

So when RAM dividers are set at 2.0 they are always at 1:1?

edit: I'm running at 9.5x300 (2850mhz) now with RAM divier at 2.0. Everything stock voltage right now. So is my memory currently running at normal speed or below normal? I think it showed it at 600 or something instead of 1066.

computer is stable with the specs listed in the above post, so says a long Prime95 run anyways.

Adaman said:

Thanks.

So when RAM dividers are set at 2.0 they are always at 1:1?

edit: I'm running at 9.5x300 (2850mhz) now with RAM divier at 2.0. Everything stock voltage right now. So is my memory currently running at normal speed or below normal? I think it showed it at 600 or something instead of 1066.

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I don't know how gigabyte phrases it... post up a screenshot of cpuz memory tab (looking specifically at the DRAM frequency number & FSBRAM number).

Sorry I can't help further today, I gotta leave work and wont be able to check back till tomorrow.

GL

karkas said:

I don't know how gigabyte phrases it... post up a screenshot of cpuz memory tab (looking specifically at the DRAM frequency number & FSBRAM number).

Sorry I can't help further today, I gotta leave work and wont be able to check back till tomorrow.

GL

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Here ya go: CPUZ memory tab - Says DRAM frequency is at 300mhz.

No worries, have a good day.

edit: Tried to boot up at 3.2ghz (9.5X340FSB) and it was no go. Then raised the vcore to 1.25 and it still wouldn't boot, then raised vcore to 1.3 and it still wouldn't boot. So it's kinda weird I can run a 9.5x300 (2.85ghz) at stock voltage but not 3.2 at 1.3 vcore. Again I always fear I'm doing something wrong but I dunno. Does that seem weird?

OK, your RAM is indeed running at 1:1 so leave that RAM divider at 2.0 until you reach max OC, actually after skimming previous posts jason4207 already stated this.

Post up your BIOS settings where you are at your max stable OC but higher will be unstable or wont boot.

FYI, I like to use intel burn test while ramping up my OC's. A quick 1-2 pass run after an FSB change will tell you if you need to add some voltage somewhere. A short run pass by no means guarantee's stability, but it can quickly get you in the ballpark. I still like to use P95, when I think my rig is stable, but IBT is great for super quick testing when OCing.

BEWARE: IBT will heat up your CPU like no other, keep her under 80c and you should be fine. Make sure you have the most current versions of either core temp or real temp.

After a few days of doing a lot of testing I believe my max stable CPU speed on stock voltage is 9.5x310 (2945mhz). Haven't tried any other multipliers though. Memory radio is still 1:1.

Should I rather be trying the lowest possible multiplier (6.0)? Grand theft auto 4 is out tomorrow and I want to get my computer ready in time