1055t What more can I do?

So I got my CPU up to 3.864GHz, I was really hoping to get 4GHz out of it. Is there anything more I can try to hit that goal? My system specs are in my signature.

Settings:
FSB - 276MHz
CPU-HT / NB-HT - 9x @ 2484MHz

CPU - 1.425v
NB - 1.17v (+.02)
HTT - 1.20v (+.02)
(I may have the voltages backwards)

With these settings everything is running stable.

The system runs fine at FSB 278MHz and runs days worth of stress and stressCPU (Linux apps) but then reports errors when running Folding@Home. I have increased the CPU to 1.45v and 1.475v, NB to 1.19v, and HTT to 1.22v with no change. Temps have never gone above 53C at its highest point. During these tests I switch my RAM to 8-8-8-24 at 4x (rated for 7-7-7-20 @ 1333) and I have run memtest86 for a few runs just to make sure memory isn't my issue, I've made that mistake before.

FSB at 280 barely boots, hard locked on me a few times. So have I reached the limits of my motherboard or am I not pushing something far enough? It feels like it is the motherboard but could it be that my CPU needs the dreaded life sucking 1.5v?

Are you using stock cooling?

My Current Baby

Case - Cooler Master HAF X
PSU - Ultra X4 1600w
Motherboard - ASUS Crosshair IV Extreme
CPU - AMD Phenom II X6 1100T OC (3.8 Ghz) Water Cooled
GPU - XFX HD 6970 OC (x3)
Memory - 16GB CORSAIR Vengeance DDR3 1600 (OC 2000)
Boot SSD - Corsair Performance 3 128GB SATA 6Gb/s
Storage HDD - Western Digital Cavair Black 2TB SATA 6Gb/s RAID 1 (x2)
Sound Card - Sound Blaster X-Fi Fatal1ty

You can raise those NB speeds. Mines at 2700. Your cpu is not stable if it is getting errors when folding. I suggest you raise that NB voltage up a bit more. With the 1055t, it will be your ram and motherboard that hinders overclocking. I use to have problems getting past 3.5 ghz since I was using 1333 ram with bad timings. Once I upgraded to 1600 with good timings, it allowed me to push the fsb further.

So it could be your ram.

Zerix01 said:

The system runs fine at FSB 278MHz and runs days worth of stress and stressCPU (Linux apps) but then reports errors when running Folding@Home. I have increased the CPU to 1.45v and 1.475v, NB to 1.19v, and HTT to 1.22v with no change. Temps have never gone above 53C at its highest point. During these tests I switch my RAM to 8-8-8-24 at 4x (rated for 7-7-7-20 @ 1333) and I have run memtest86 for a few runs just to make sure memory isn't my issue, I've made that mistake before.

FSB at 280 barely boots, hard locked on me a few times. So have I reached the limits of my motherboard or am I not pushing something far enough? It feels like it is the motherboard but could it be that my CPU needs the dreaded life sucking 1.5v?

Click to expand...

One way to know for sure if it's the CPU or something else is to turn the CPU multiplier down a full notch and increase the clock speed. If it's the CPU holding you back then it should take the clock increase without a problem. If it's something else then it will still be unstable with the lower CPU speed.

HvegasCowboy said:

Are you using stock cooling?

Click to expand...

Cooler master v6GT with IC Diamond paste, pretty nice but I don't think the fans are running at the rated speed.

You can raise those NB speeds. Mines at 2700. Your cpu is not stable if it is getting errors when folding. I suggest you raise that NB voltage up a bit more. With the 1055t, it will be your ram and motherboard that hinders overclocking. I use to have problems getting past 3.5 ghz since I was using 1333 ram with bad timings. Once I upgraded to 1600 with good timings, it allowed me to push the fsb further.

Click to expand...

What is a safe limit on NB voltage? Should I also raise the HTT voltage in equal increments? Also I know increasing the NB speed can help stabilize an OC but at the same time it OC's the L3 cache. Wouldn't this add a new element of instability? The increase in NB might help the CPU but then destabilize the L3, or is the L3 rated at a higher speed?

One way to know for sure if it's the CPU or something else is to turn the CPU multiplier down a full notch and increase the clock speed.

Click to expand...

I'll try that out tonight, thanks.

Apparently my current OC isn't as stable as I thought. I've been folding these nice small work units for days then today I got a big one that takes about 2.5x as long to process and it died at about 40%. Funny thing is it reported an error that is common for an unstable GPU. Maybe they merged some code and never updated the wiki. But the error is a miscalculation, they have codes that mean unstable RAM, so I would like to think my RAM is still fine.

So the highest my voltages will go and still let the system post is 1.19 and 1.21.

Dropping my CPU multi by 1 still has instability during bigger work units. So looks more like an issue with the mobo. I tried raising the CPU-NB and HTT speed up to 10x (2.760GHz) and it failed to post. Prior to this I was running them at 9x (2.484GHz). Now I dropped it to 8x (2.208GHz) and left the CPU at 13x. If this is stable I'll bump the CPU back up to 14x.

The thing is I keep reading that for higher CPU clock speeds you should have a high NB speed. But shouldn't this cause instability? The old AM2 rules of don't go far over 2GHz made more sense to me, since you are overclocking the bus and it could cause instability.

what bios are you on for the motherboard? heres link for bios for that board if youre not on latest update http://www.gigabyte.com/products/product-page.aspx?pid=3417&dl=1#bios

For Cpu-nb I think up to 1.24-1.26 is safe if I recall. You can up the voltage on the NB also to around those levels.

what bios are you on for the motherboard? heres link for bios for that board if youre not on latest update

Click to expand...

Yeah latest BIOS, F6. Was on F4 for a while there and that gave all kinds of OC problems.

For Cpu-nb I think up to 1.24-1.26 is safe if I recall. You can up the voltage on the NB also to around those levels.

Click to expand...

Well that sucks, I don't think my board will let me boot if I bump it that high. Well still testing with the HT at 2.2GHz.

Zerix01 said:

The thing is I keep reading that for higher CPU clock speeds you should have a high NB speed. But shouldn't this cause instability? The old AM2 rules of don't go far over 2GHz made more sense to me, since you are overclocking the bus and it could cause instability.

Click to expand...

The cpuNB incorporates what WAS (K8 = s939/AM2) the Crossbar as well as the IMC and L3 cache. The old AM2 crossbar ran at CPU speeds (we think) and conjecture has it this was the big limiter on those K8 overclocks. Separating it out to have it's own speed and voltage control was a big step. Considering past performance I wouldn't be too worried about the cpuNB speeds going above 2000 MHz since 95% of the K8's could run 2400 MHz without a problem and most only started having problems at 2600+ MHz speeds.

The HT Link is a different thing altogether. The largest part of the HT Link is and always has been on the motherboard. The CPU only has an end node on it but not the main hub. With HT 1.0 (s939/AM2) the HT Link spec was 1000 MHz but the HT 2.0 (AM2+/AM3) spec is 2600 MHz. Setting it too high can still cause instability but not for the same reasons.

(Note: It's the CPU's that have an HT Link spec of 2000 MHz, some even less, but that's not the HT Link spec for the board.)

Thanks that actually helps out a lot. It never dawned on me the cpuNB was, well part of the CPU.