[D4rkAngel454]

Hi,

Im new on this site AND in OC ...
I would like to know what the maximum overclocking i can do with the hardware i have or something decent maybe not the max but near it to run it good without any problems... im playing the new beta of battlefield bad company 2 and its not fluide and it bug me hard hehe, let me write all my hardware and setting im using.

CPU: Core2Duo E8500 3.16ghz ( stock FAN but i have a Zalman CNPS9700 at my job so im gonna install this)
GPU: ATI Sapphire HD4850 512mb DDR3
Ram: Kingston HyperX 4x1gb DDR2 PC6400 5-5-5-5-15
Mobo: Asus P5Q
PSU: Antec TruePower Trio 550W
HDD: WD Velociraptor 150gb, WD1500BLFS
LCD: Samsung 24" 2493HM

im playing most of my games with the res 1920x1200 with custom vid settings

Thank you.!!

[RollingThunder]

Originally Posted by D4rkAngel454

Hi,

Im new on this site AND in OC ...
I would like to know what the maximum overclocking i can do with the hardware i have or something decent maybe not the max but near it to run it good without any problems... im playing the new beta of battlefield bad company 2 and its not fluide and it bug me hard hehe, let me write all my hardware and setting im using.

CPU: Core2Duo E8500 3.16ghz
GPU: ATI Sapphire HD4850 512mb DDR3
Ram: Kingston HyperX 4x1gb DDR2 PC6400 5-5-5-5-15
Mobo: Asus P5Q
PSU: Antec TruePower Trio 550W
HDD: Velociraptor 150gb, WD1500BLFS
LCD: Samsung 24" 2493HM

im playing most of my games with the res 1920x1200 with custom vid settings

Thank you.!!

DA,

Our rigs are similar and I'm on stock voltage and cooling at this speed, any higher and you'll need a better dedicated CPU cooling setup. The E8500 will clock well over 4 Mhz with proper cooling but four sticks of RAM will limit your overclock, 2 x 2 GB sticks are much better. Depending on how high you want to go, your PC6400 RAMS will also limit you. Some stock RAMs overclock better than others.

The Asus PQ5 guys can help you a lot, they'll be around soon. Maybe they will post you some screen shots for a few mild overclocks like mine. I can't because our motherboards and BIOS are different.

[MattNo5ss]

You should be able to safely do 9.5x400MHz (3.8GHz) with no or little vcore increase.

I also, agree with RollingThunder about DDR2-800 RAM limiting you to ~3.8GHz, you'll need good aftermarket cooling and possibly new RAM to go any higher.

[RollingThunder]

Originally Posted by MattNo5ss

You should be able to safely do 9.5x400MHz (3.8GHz) with no or little vcore increase.

I also, agree with RollingThunder about DDR2-800 RAM limiting you to ~3.8GHz, you'll need good aftermarket cooling and possibly new RAM to go any higher.

Matt,

The only thing that kept me from going to 3.8MHz was my stock cooling. At this speed I'm about 68 C Orthos / Prime 95 so I stopped there but I'm not a "hotrod" anymore either. I've found the E seies Intels to be very nice chips while coming from an AMD Opteron. I always "overbuy" my RAMs in case I get that urge to "hotrod" again!

Geez, Bobnova gets 3.7MHz from his E5200!

[D4rkAngel454]

3.8ghz sounds good to me ill need to give it a try tonight and post back

well for the cooling the Zalman CNPS9700 is good enough !?

[RollingThunder]

Originally Posted by D4rkAngel454

3.8ghz sounds good to me ill need to give it a try tonight and post back

well for the cooling the Zalman CNPS9700 is good enough !?

Yep, anything is better than stock cooling. You should have no problems with cooling. However, set your RAM timings and voltage manually to default factory settings and try one step up (~3.33 MHz) at a time because you don't know how far your RAMs will take you overclocked.

Run Memtest86 from a boot disk, Superpi 32 mb test and Prime 95 each step. You don't want to corrupt your operating system if your RAMs fail in Windows.

Get those programs, they're all free, and set them up ready to run and give it a go. You can back off your RAMs with different multipliers too but CPU speed rules over RAM speeds.

[D4rkAngel454]

Originally Posted by RollingThunder

Yep, anything is better than stock cooling. You should have no problems with cooling. However, set your RAM timings and voltage manually to default factory settings and try one step up (~3.33 MHz) at a time because you don't know how far your RAMs will take you overclocked.

Run Memtest86 from a boot disk, Superpi 32 mb test and Prime 95 each step. You don't want to corrupt your operating system if your RAMs fail in Windows.

Get those programs, they're all free, and set them up ready to run and give it a go. You can back off your RAMs with different multipliers too but CPU speed rules over RAM speeds.

Yeah, ill do a ghost before doing that :P
what type of cooling r u using?

[RollingThunder]

Originally Posted by D4rkAngel454

Yeah, ill do a ghost before doing that :P
what type of cooling r u using?

DA,

Stock cooler in the retail box (POS ) but it works where I am.

[MattNo5ss]

Originally Posted by RollingThunder

Matt,

The only thing that kept me from going to 3.8MHz was my stock cooling. At this speed I'm about 68 C Orthos / Prime 95 so I stopped there but I'm not a "hotrod" anymore either. I've found the E seies Intels to be very nice chips while coming from an AMD Opteron. I always "overbuy" my RAMs in case I get that urge to "hotrod" again!

Geez, Bobnova gets 3.7MHz from his E5200!

I wasn't necessarily directing my post at you, but I guess it applied...
You're much more conservative than I am, when it comes to temps
I think "overbuying" RAM is always a good idea too. It seems I didn't "overbuy" enough though.


D4rkAngel454,

Your RAM won't be OC'ed unless you try going over 400MHz FSB, as long as you keep a 1:1 FSB:RAM ratio.

As RT said, anything is better than stock cooling.
How much is that Zalman goin to cost you? There may be a better option.

[D4rkAngel454]

i tried at 3.8ghz with stock cooling but it was going at core0:86 core1:83 with my stock cooling ... u got 68c stable on both core thunder!? which test u did in prime95?

[MattNo5ss]

He's at 3.6GHz and possibly lower voltage. 3.8GHz might be too much for stock cooling, you may have to wait for a new heatsink before you try 3.8GHz. What vcore are you running?

[D4rkAngel454]

here a screenshot of cpuz voltage is btw 1.280-1.296v

http://img705.imageshack.us/img705/230/cpuza.jpg

[MattNo5ss]

Your vcore isn't really high, but you could try reducing it in small steps and testing with P95. Just keep reducing until P95 fails, then bump it back up to the last stable vcore. That's all you can do to reduce temps further with stock cooler while maintaining 3.8GHz.

If temps are still too high, you'll just have to back off the clock.

[D4rkAngel454]

yeah ok, anyway im gonna change my cooler for the zalman ...
ill try that and give some news later

[RollingThunder]

Originally Posted by D4rkAngel454

i tried at 3.8ghz with stock cooling but it was going at core0:86 core1:83 with my stock cooling ... u got 68c stable on both core thunder!? which test u did in prime95?

Originally Posted by MattNo5ss

He's at 3.6GHz and possibly lower voltage. 3.8GHz might be too much for stock cooling, you may have to wait for a new heatsink before you try 3.8GHz. What vcore are you running?

Using Othos, same as Prime 95 but with better GUI. I'm not surprised your temps are too high at 3.8 MHz, that's why I stopped with all stock voltage and cooling. It's about the limit. More is easy with better cooling. This is not a Prime 95 / Orthos stress shot but yes, stable all day at 68 - 69 C. I've reset and cleaned cooler couple times with new Arctic Silver to make sure that's my stock limit.

Photo shows my max CPU voltage: 1.18v

[D4rkAngel454]

Originally Posted by MattNo5ss

I wasn't necessarily directing my post at you, but I guess it applied...
You're much more conservative than I am, when it comes to temps
I think "overbuying" RAM is always a good idea too. It seems I didn't "overbuy" enough though.


D4rkAngel454,

Your RAM won't be OC'ed unless you try going over 400MHz FSB, as long as you keep a 1:1 FSB:RAM ratio.

As RT said, anything is better than stock cooling.
How much is that Zalman goin to cost you? There may be a better option.

Sorry matt i didnt that post dunno why o_O that Zalman gonna cost me almost nothing maybe, that zalman is the old cooler of my boss so ... but he changed his cpu, maybe btw 50-70$

Thunder, ill need to clean my cpu too and put some new arctic silver too ... because i did stop the test because it was going over 86c on both core .... ill try to change my cooler this friday and retest all this.

[RollingThunder]

Originally Posted by D4rkAngel454

Sorry matt i didnt that post dunno why o_O that Zalman gonna cost me almost nothing maybe, that zalman is the old cooler of my boss so ... but he changed his cpu, maybe btw 50-70$

Thunder, ill need to clean my cpu too and put some new arctic silver too ... because i did stop the test because it was going over 86c on both core .... ill try to change my cooler this friday and retest all this.

DA,

My self-imposed temp limit is ~70 - 72 C. It's conservative according to Intel specs (~74 C). When I reach 68 - 69 C, that's enough for me with stock cooling. You should do 4.0 MHz with that cooler or close to it. Many guys here are doing 4.2 MHz with a good cooler on air.

[MattNo5ss]

Originally Posted by D4rkAngel454

Sorry matt i didnt that post dunno why o_O that Zalman gonna cost me almost nothing maybe, that zalman is the old cooler of my boss so ... but he changed his cpu, maybe btw 50-70$

Thunder, ill need to clean my cpu too and put some new arctic silver too ... because i did stop the test because it was going over 86c on both core .... ill try to change my cooler this friday and retest all this.

If you can get the cooler close to nothing, then go with it. If it will cost $50-70, then there are better options.

[D4rkAngel454]

Originally Posted by MattNo5ss

If you can get the cooler close to nothing, then go with it. If it will cost $50-70, then there are better options.

Ya,

I saw you have a Xigmatek, what computer case do you have? dunno if it will fit in mine o_O i have a antec Atlas 550.

[MattNo5ss]

I'm using an Antec 900. The width of the 900 and Atlas 550 are the same, 8.1". So, tower heatsinks should fit in your case just fine.