Overclocking Escapades: socket LGA1366 Intel Core i7 930

Just recently I picked up a Core i7 930 CPU and put it into a board of mine yesterday for testing.

I honestly have no experience whatsoever with overclocking an LGA1366 CPU, so this is a totally new experience for me.

Decided earlier today that I would try to see what I could get out of it. Luckily I found a guide on it here, so I wasn't completely lost for too long. Thankfully it was well written and quite helpful, though I still don't quite understand what "Uncore" is or does for the system.

The load temperatures at stock seemed reasonable at 58°C-59°C-59°C-55°C, so I decided to proceed on with the first overclock attempt. This was during a 4.5 hour run of Prime95 blend while I was asleep.

Figured I would go for a nice small 700MHz overclock to start out for a 3.5GHz core speed. So, I punched the figures in for a 22x multiplier and 160MHz bus speed with stock voltage of 1.25V (what my board had as default), disabled the power saving features (EIST, C-states, etc), and manually set my memory timings, speeds, and voltages.

With the mild overclock to 3.5GHz load temperatures still seem reasonable at 65°C-65°C-65°C-62°C. I'm kind of surprised they're doing that well on air cooling actually, I was expecting something higher for some reason, though I don't mind the lower temps. I've just got a Thermalright TRUE on it with 2x Cooler Master SickleFlow 120x25mm fans.

It seems stable so far, and got about 2 seconds faster on Super Pi 1M. I actually also got the memory running at the rated DDR3-1600 with 8-8-8-24-1T timings, which surprised me as I didn't think it would run with 1600MHz without increased settings somewhere for that.

Not bad for someone that isn't entirely sure what they are doing working with a platform they are unfamiliar with.

3.5GHz: 1.19-1.20V (1.2V)
3.6GHz: 1.19-1.20V (1.2V)
3.7GHz: 1.19-1.20V (1.2V)
3.8GHz: 1.22-1.23V (1.225V)
3.9GHz: 1.25-1.26V (1.25625V)
4.0GHz: 1.28-1.3V (1.28750V Vcore +1.225V VQPI)
4.1GHz: 1.323-1.389v (1.33750v+1.325v QPI & 1.33866v IOH) Asus Rampage II Extreme
4.2GHz: 1.356-1.442v (1.3750v+1.4v QPI & 1.35191v IOH) Asus Rampage II Extreme

System 1 specs:
CPU: Intel Core i7 930 (2.8GHz stock 133MHz X 22x multiplier)
Motherboard: Asus P6T SE
Memory: G.Skill 6GB (3x2GB sticks) F312800CL8T-6GBRM (DDR3-1600/PC3-12800) 8-8-8-24-2T @1.6V
Graphics: Evga GTX260 192 CUDA cores
CPU cooling: Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme Black Edition with two Cooler Master SickleFlow 120x25mm blue LED fans in push-pull
HDD: Seagate 7200.10 80GB SATA II


System 2 specs:
CPU: Intel Core i7 930 (2.8GHz stock 133MHz X 22x multiplier)
Motherboard: Asus Rampage II Extreme
Memory: G.Skill 6GB (3x2GB sticks) F312800CL8T-6GBRM (DDR3-1600/PC3-12800) 8-8-8-24-1T @1.55V
Graphics: Evga GTX570
CPU cooling: Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme Black Edition with two Cooler Master SickleFlow 120x25mm blue LED fans in push-pull
HDD: Western Digital Caviar Blue 160GB (the Seagate drive died )

Not bad at all.
I never had 1366 experience myself till recently came across an alienware A51-X58 Sporting the i7 920 with 3gb ram, It has a P6T Deluxe in it. Now it's sporting a X5670 Westmere with a Ripjaw 12gb 1333mhz set c7 . I'm excited to see what I can achieve with those higher multi's .. This thing runs surprisingly cool .. havent broken 53c at 3.2 with 1.2v with a Dark Knight.

Yep Westmere's are pretty nice, have been even thinking of plunking a bigger one in here.

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2335636&highlight=l5639&page=47

In a nutshell, Uncore is the L3 cache and memory controller, and its powered not by Vcore, but by VTT.
Uncore multiplier needs to be 2x or higher than the memory multiplier.

Mr.Scott said:

In a nutshell, Uncore is the L3 cache and memory controller, and its powered not by Vcore, but by VTT.
Uncore multiplier needs to be 2x or higher than the memory multiplier.

Click to expand...

Yeah and many (if not most) Bloomfields don't really like running 4000Mhz(+) NB/Uncore. It can require quite a bit of VTT to run DDR3-2000(+)

I still have some of my X58 era parts and I recently started running a combo again... An i7 920/EVGA Classified. It is currently ''crunching" Rosetta and cooling is with a Corsair H110.

Seems as if I was giving it more voltage than necessary.

I'm now at 3.6GHz and have lowered the CPU voltage down to 1.225V so far, going to see if I can get it to go lower and run stable.

1.2V *still need to test for stability, but it is running:

If it helps, my chip at stock+turbo (3.6) uses 1.2v. 4ghz comes at 1.275v. Your chip may be similar

All of the Bloomfields that I've tested seemed to run up to ~3.8Ghz with out really breaking a sweat. I found that odd multi like 19,21,23 always seemed to work better when pushing overclocks as well. Maybe try something like 19x200 @ ddr3-1600 and then push on to 20x200 @ ddr3-1600 or 21x190/191. I'd run uncore at 16x to start and then maybe push (test) higher uncore once you find out how your chip runs. The overclock bell curve (wall) seemed to often start showing up for these chips around 4.0Ghz.

I can swing 4800mhz out of mine with an h100, but generally I run it between 4200-4500mhz, using 1.325v-1.45v. I have been able to run the uncore up to 4000mhz, but tend to keep it between 3200-3600mhz.

freeagent said:

If it helps, my chip at stock+turbo (3.6) uses 1.2v. 4ghz comes at 1.275v. Your chip may be similar

Click to expand...

Thanks for the tip.

Also, an update. The system is indeed stable at 3.6GHz with 1.2V. I left it running for about three hours on Prime95 blend while I was in town running errands, and came back to find it still running with no errors and no warnings.

I'm sorry, for some reason I thought you were running a Westmere

Glad to help a little anyways

freeagent said:

I'm sorry, for some reason I thought you were running a Westmere

Glad to help a little anyways

Click to expand...

Yes, I was a bit confused when I looked and saw the Xeon X5690 in your sig. Figured maybe you had a 920 or 930 a while back or something and were talking about that. Perfectly alright though, we all make mistakes.

Looked into Westmeres' a bit actually, but haven't found any I can afford yet.

Well, 3.7GHz was also stable at 1.2V. Passed a 2.5 hour test of Prime95 blend last night with flying colors and completed multiple benchmark runs. The other nice thing is that with the drop in the required voltage I've gotten a 3-4°C reduction in load temperatures.

Going to try for 3.8GHz next.

There was a slight voltage boost required for 3.8GHz to be stable. I increased the voltage to 1.225V then all was fine, passed a 2 hour test on Prime95 blend.

I'm quite impressed, a 1GHz overclock (stock is 2.8GHz) with less than stock voltage (stock is 1.25V).

Managed to get 3.9GHz with 1.25V.

Now trying for 4.0GHz.

Looks good

My first 1366 CPU was a 965XE C0. I think it needed 1.35 for 4ghz, and 1.4v for 4.1. It was much stronger than the 775 setup it replaced.. Overclocking just wasn't its thing lol. The 970 that replaced it shared the exact same traits as the 965 did, but the 970 had a crazy good imc, I was able to run some adatas that I had up to 1175mhz, the CPU would not run 4200mhz even with 1.55v I traded it and some cash for my Xeon. I've benched it at 4.8 with around 1.55v it so.. But it doesn't like memory speeds much over 1000mhz, but it can run uncore way higher then my 970 could. Anyways.. I'm rambling now.

Any updates for your Bloomfield?

PolRoger said:

Any updates for your Bloomfield?

Click to expand...

Well, made 4GHz with 1.28V.

Temps were a bit high though, I was hitting 70°C+ under load.

freeagent said:

Looks good

My first 1366 CPU was a 965XE C0. I think it needed 1.35 for 4ghz, and 1.4v for 4.1. It was much stronger than the 775 setup it replaced.. Overclocking just wasn't its thing lol. The 970 that replaced it shared the exact same traits as the 965 did, but the 970 had a crazy good imc, I was able to run some adatas that I had up to 1175mhz, the CPU would not run 4200mhz even with 1.55v I traded it and some cash for my Xeon. I've benched it at 4.8 with around 1.55v it so.. But it doesn't like memory speeds much over 1000mhz, but it can run uncore way higher then my 970 could. Anyways.. I'm rambling now.

Click to expand...

I'm still stalking you and want to steal your X5690.

he he he.

Just kidding a bit.

Love these things, even at 3.8 wipes out the old I7 920 D0 that was clocked faster I had in here by a lot.

I'll spring for a X5660 probably in near future and put this one in the other and sell the 920 I imagine.

It's funny because the one of the first threads I come across is about a 1366 I7 and I'm running an I7-940 at 3.8 and memory at 192 with 9-10-10-28-37 timings. I'm thinking about upgrading to an ASUS X79-Deluxe with a 4930 I7 but I'm not sure I would gain much. I bought G-Skill Ripjaw Z memory PC-2400 because I had the intention of jumping up to 2011 but now I'm not sure if it's worth it since my old I7-940 is so good!