[TehVine]

So, here is what I have been able to run my Q9300 at for a few days so far:


Now, it seems I may have a decent chip seeing as though when I am not priming, I am at 1.264Vcore. My dilemma is, do I upgrade to a Q9550 now, or do I switch to an E8600 for even higher clock numbers? I am sure I could push this to 3.5+ but I rather keep my NB temps where they are. I know if I go to a Q9550 I will be getting an 8.5x multi which allows higher numbers. I am just looking for some insight on if an E8600 clocked beyond 4.0 is going to give me better bang than my Q9300 @ 3.4. Just as a side note - it's not going to cost me anything either way. I would be trading the Q9300 and my, now unused, DP45SG for whichever chip I would switch to.

Edit: Also, to go with said decently low Vcore, my temps are delicious too.

[EarthDog]

I wouldnt. There isnt a darn thing you could throw at that chip that it wouldnt eat up and spit back out. Unless you are a benching queen or part of the benching team, I would say there is no need.

[TehVine]

Well I guess I could have him get the Q9550 and if it doesn't clock well at all, I could always switch it back no harm no foul.

[Badbonji]

You can push it further, overclocking the CPU a bit more probably wont need another NB bump and so the temps shouldn't go up :P 1.36Vcore is the highest, so push for 3.6Ghz

[Evilsizer]

yea it looks like you can get into the 3.6-3.8ghz area with that cpu.

[EarthDog]

....saying that mobo will allow for 480+ FSB...Its a P45 so you should be ok though. 500+ and you are seriously pushing it and will likely need some more volts on the NB (even at 480 really).

Try it though. It wont hurt and could only help!

[Steven-1979]

I have the same mobo as you and have pushed 450fsb on stock mch volts and 500fsb on 1.32v mch ... so you should be able to go a lot further. BUT you mentioned it will cost you nothing to upgrade to a Q9550? If that is the case, I would go that route in a heart beat.

[jdf_warrior]

Higher clock speeds or not, I wouldnt swap a quad for a dual...
If its not gonna cost you anything, I'd prob grab up the q9550, but I also agree with some of the other guys in saying that you should be able to push further with what you have too..

[TehVine]

Well, have it up to 3496 now with a 466 fsb. As soon as I hit 467 the 4th core becomes upset and fails small fft in about 35 seconds, tried more vcore and mch, no dice.

[Evilsizer]

did you change the CPUVTT or the CPUGTL at all?

[EarthDog]

Try the GTLref 1st... If only one core is failing and you arent hard freezing, GTLref may be all you need.

[TehVine]

I haven't touched either since I really don't know what they do yet, will have to read some I guess.

[Edward2]

I have a Q9300 on a P5Q-Pro mobo, but I have not been able to get higher than 3.0GHz so far. What settings have you changed in the BIOS to reach 3.4GHz? I can run 3.0G at 1.2 Vc, but it will not even boot into Windows at 3.2G at 1.3Vc. I haven't really played with the other voltages, other than Vmem.

[Evilsizer]

other voltages that need to be mess with on 45nm quads are cpuvtt and cpugtl. without these ocing 45nm quads will be hard/limited.

[EarthDog]

As I understood, and used GTLref, its more of a fine tweak. It has to do with signaling over/undershoot and is based off of VTT voltage (.67 of VTT = GTLref). It can be used to fine tune and stabilize an overclock.

Set GTLref to .67 or 00mv depending on your board. and go from there. Likely you will need to raise it a bit. Try .69 or .71.

[TehVine]

Originally Posted by Edward2

I have a Q9300 on a P5Q-Pro mobo, but I have not been able to get higher than 3.0GHz so far. What settings have you changed in the BIOS to reach 3.4GHz? I can run 3.0G at 1.2 Vc, but it will not even boot into Windows at 3.2G at 1.3Vc. I haven't really played with the other voltages, other than Vmem.

The biggest thing I did was dropped down the memory divider to hit 3.3ghz. I had set it to 1066 (1333 is my memory) and loosened the timings all by 1. That allowed me to get memory to like 1448 or so. I dropped it down again to 800 speeds when i went for my new speeds. So now at 3.5 my memory is only 1113 with those slow timings but I am leaving it that way until i can get the cpu itself stable at a higher speed, then I will figure out what I am doing with the memory. Will either clock it up with loose timings or leave it low and tighten timings. Right now my Vcore is set to like 1.29xxxx in bios and memory is sitting at 1.65v. The Vcore I originally just tossed to 1.28 as a random number to just get the chip to clock up without having to constantly tweak it. Was more of a brute force push, eventually I needed more vcore.