AMD FX 6100 and BIOS

[Moskar]

Hey guys, been browsing around here for some time and thought I should make an account

Anyway, so i've got myself to a stable 4.3ghz overclock but I want to push it further as i'm not exceeding 35c, this is all achieved with a Noctua Fan and Stock voltages and I'm only overclocking the CPU multiplier for now.

So to reach 4.4ghz I think I need to increase the voltage because different cores keep dropping out during Prime95 tests, my question is;

On my bios (I have an ASUS M5A78L-M/USB3 motherboard) there is CPU VCORE, it doesn't have a drop down type list like the multiplier, so when you press +/- it will increase by an 'increment'. I was just wondering if it starts off at the very bottom? I tried booting at 1.0375 and it crashes. Stock voltage for my cpu should be 1.3375, i'm just asking if it really is 1.0375? Should I keep pressing the + to reach 1.3375? I'm more worried that I am wrong or not reading this properly, and I don't feel like putting my cpu to a ridiculous voltage and make it explode.

I've read guides and nothing really says about having to press + until you reach your standard voltage, it seems to be obvious but I dunno. Better safe then sorry. One other thing, how do you know when to give up with overclocking? I've read that you can reach 4.8ghz stable with this chip, I wouldn't push mine that far but a 4.5ghz and not reaching 50c under full load would be great!

 

[Hicksimus]

(I have an ASUS M5A78L-M/USB3 motherboard)

It's not likely to be the 6100 exploding, but it could easily be the CPU VRM on that board. 1.3375 is the voltage you'll want to start at, maybe a bit higher.

But back to the VRM. It's not really beefy enough to be up to pushing a bulldozer hard and it's also lacking a heatsink so you could easily hurt it with an FX-6100. At one point I could go from an idle system power draw of ~130 at the wall to over 420 watts with just CPU stress on my 6100.

If you're looking for more power you can try a mixture of bus speed and multiplier. With that you can achieve better results without pushing harder.

Edit: When they say 140w CPU support on a cheap board such as that they are leaning towards the literal meaning of the statement. So it's more of a case of the board being able to deal with regular use of a 140w CPU for the duration of the warranty period. You can likely go a bit over 140w but don't say I didn't warn you.

 

[Anonaru]

It's not likely to be the 6100 exploding, but it could easily be the CPU VRM on that board. 1.3375 is the voltage you'll want to start at, maybe a bit higher.

But back to the VRM. It's not really beefy enough to be up to pushing a bulldozer hard and it's also lacking a heatsink so you could easily hurt it with an FX-6100. At one point I could go from an idle system power draw of ~130 at the wall to over 420 watts with just CPU stress on my 6100.

If you're looking for more power you can try a mixture of bus speed and multiplier. With that you can achieve better results without pushing harder.

This. Also,

The BD parts stop showing noticable gains when OCing once you break 4.3GHz. Like, almost an absolute brick wall. 4.3 is the drop off point, where power usage and heat sharply increases, and performance-per-clock gains diminish far more sharply. If your mobo has no HS on the VRM, you're likely to burn something out if you start messing with the voltage requirements of BD beyond 4.4 GHz

 

[Moskar]

I've got a good heatsink and cpu fan so temperatures aren't really something to worry about. But if you guys are suggesting I don't go over 4.3ghz then i'm fine with that, already a whole 1ghz ahead of stock

I'm not 100% sure on the whole bus speed overclocking, I don't think you can go past 2600 mhz? OR that might be HT or something...

Thanks for replies though !

 

[Anonaru]

I've got a good heatsink and cpu fan so temperatures aren't really something to worry about. But if you guys are suggesting I don't go over 4.3ghz then i'm fine with that, already a whole 1ghz ahead of stock

I'm not 100% sure on the whole bus speed overclocking, I don't think you can go past 2600 mhz? OR that might be HT or something...

Thanks for replies though !

Optimally you will run your FSB at 219-226 range and use multiplier to get your CPU clock to around 4.3GHz. You want to keep your HT/NB Frequency the same and something in the 2.2-2.4 range. Going past 2400 can net you stability issues. If you go past 2,250MHz on the NB, you should supplement it voltage, 1.275 ish should hold you pretty good in this regard.

A FSB + Multi OC nets you more performance (Particularly on Piledriver) than a multi-only OC, and it typically runs slightly cooler / requires slightly less power.

 

[Hicksimus]

I've got a good heatsink and cpu fan so temperatures aren't really something to worry about.

But do you have a VRM heatsink? The part of your board that deals with the power demands of your CPU is just a 4+1 phase design, many boards that are suitable for pushing bulldozer processors are more like 8+2 phase AND they come with heatsinks because your 6100 can jump from 95 watts to over 300.

Check out this guy's little fire. He had great CPU cooling, and his VRM had a heatsink but it was still just a cheap 4+1 phase and it lit on fire when he stress tested a processor with about as much draw as a 4.5Ghz bulldozer. Many boards have protection to prevent the fire but it will just silently hurt your performance or crash instead.

Edit: Even though the motherboard I used for my FX-6100 build came with a decent VRM and heatsink I still spent a little extra on the copper VRM heatsink in this picture and in the end I think it paid off because the power draw was getting pretty crazy over 4.7Ghz and it may have started throttling without.

 

[Anonaru]

But do you have a VRM heatsink? The part of your board that deals with the power demands of your CPU is just a 4+1 phase design, many boards that are suitable for pushing bulldozer processors are more like 8+2 phase AND they come with heatsinks because your 6100 can jump from 95 watts to over 300.

Check out this guy's little fire. He had great CPU cooling, and his VRM had a heatsink but it was still just a cheap 4+1 phase and it lit on fire when he stress tested a processor with about as much draw as a 4.5Ghz bulldozer. Many boards have protection to prevent the fire but it will just silently hurt your performance or crash instead.

Lmao, I read that he had a heatsink on his VRMS when he said he had a good HS, thanks for bringing this point back up!

This is very true, you definitly don't want to go too high here-- VRMs with no heatsinks heat up very easily