Can't Seem To Break Into 3.6Ghz

[Joeflyer]

Hi all, I cannot seem to get the E8400 to overclock stable at 3.6Ghz..no matter how much voltage I apply to the CPU. Currently I have it stable at 3.546Ghz at around 1.26 Vcore and multiplier at 9. If I bump it up to 3.6 and apply more voltage, the pc will freeze up before loading to desktop, so I backed off the frequency and voltage. I have not tried adjusting the multiplier at all, but I didn't see any advantage to this. ALso, I had applied 1.4 Vcore while at 3.6, but no-go on successful boot.
Ram timings are unlinked 4-4-4-12 2T @ 2.1V. NB is at 1.35V and all other voltages auto.
Mobo is ASUS P5N32-E SLI, 680i chipset with latest BIOS 1403. I had a similar problem with the E6750 with this board. I could not get anything stable beyond 3.0Ghz at max Vcore 1.5.

At any rate, just curious as to where I may be going wrong with this. Maybe the mobo is causing the limitation? Maybe the Corsair ram I have isn't holding up to the OC challenge?

Thanks!

 

[RockerGuy]

Hi all, I cannot seem to get the E8400 to overclock stable at 3.6Ghz..no matter how much voltage I apply to the CPU. Currently I have it stable at 3.546Ghz at around 1.26 Vcore and multiplier at 9. If I bump it up to 3.6 and apply more voltage, the pc will freeze up before loading to desktop, so I backed off the frequency and voltage. I have not tried adjusting the multiplier at all, but I didn't see any advantage to this. ALso, I had applied 1.4 Vcore while at 3.6, but no-go on successful boot.
Ram timings are unlinked 4-4-4-12 2T @ 2.1V. NB is at 1.35V and all other voltages auto.
Mobo is ASUS P5N32-E SLI, 680i chipset with latest BIOS 1403. I had a similar problem with the E6750 with this board. I could not get anything stable beyond 3.0Ghz at max Vcore 1.5.

At any rate, just curious as to where I may be going wrong with this. Maybe the mobo is causing the limitation? Maybe the Corsair ram I have isn't holding up to the OC challenge?

Thanks!

Could be RAMS, could be ur NB. Try cooling ur NB and bump the voltage up if u havent

 

[Albuquerque]

Are you sure it's not your ram? Try running the CPU with multiplier 6x in the BIOS (and disable C1E and EIST to make sure it doesn't budge) and try again.

 

[blazed]

If your running your memory at DDR2 800 with 4-4-4-12 timings, and you increase the FSB by 67mhz, then your memory will also increase by 67, which may be too much for your memory running low timings. Loosen the timings, also you can drop your memory to 667mhz so when you overclock to 400FSB it will be running its usual DDR2 800.

 

[Joeflyer]

If your running your memory at DDR2 800 with 4-4-4-12 timings, and you increase the FSB by 67mhz, then your memory will also increase by 67, which may be too much for your memory running low timings. Loosen the timings, also you can drop your memory to 667mhz so when you overclock to 400FSB it will be running its usual DDR2 800.

Thanks for the tip...I did loosen the timing to 5-5-5-15 2T and am ok at 3.52Ghz but haven't tried any higher FSB speed. I may have to get better RAM but have no idea yet which RAM is most suitable for my CPU/mobo combination. I'll take any suggestions

 

[wiskerbizkit]

Hi all, I cannot seem to get the E8400 to overclock stable at 3.6Ghz..no matter how much voltage I apply to the CPU. Currently I have it stable at 3.546Ghz at around 1.26 Vcore and multiplier at 9. If I bump it up to 3.6 and apply more voltage, the pc will freeze up before loading to desktop, so I backed off the frequency and voltage. I have not tried adjusting the multiplier at all, but I didn't see any advantage to this. ALso, I had applied 1.4 Vcore while at 3.6, but no-go on successful boot.
Ram timings are unlinked 4-4-4-12 2T @ 2.1V. NB is at 1.35V and all other voltages auto.
Mobo is ASUS P5N32-E SLI, 680i chipset with latest BIOS 1403. I had a similar problem with the E6750 with this board. I could not get anything stable beyond 3.0Ghz at max Vcore 1.5.

At any rate, just curious as to where I may be going wrong with this. Maybe the mobo is causing the limitation? Maybe the Corsair ram I have isn't holding up to the OC challenge?

Thanks!

Isn't this the same problem you were having with your E6750? It was the whole reason you got the wolfdale if i recall. maybe its something totally different. give us a rundown of all of your bios settings.

 

[blazed]

If your memory is capable of 4-4-4-12 timings at DDR2 800 then you do not need faster memory, up untill around 4ghz, if you want to go higher then that and your motherboard doesn't have lower dividers, only then would you need faster memory.

I'm thinking you may have not quite fully comprehended the importance of memory to your overclock.

When your overclocking the CPU, you need your memory to not be a limiting factor in that OC. This is why you reduce the timings to 5-5-5-15 instead of 4-4-4-12, because if memory is capable of 800mhz using 4-4-4-12 then that same memory theoreticaly is capable of 1000mhz using 5-5-5-12.

The other important factor is the FSB, seems you may not have realized overclocking the FSB in turn overclocks your memory as well as the CPU. This is why you loosen the timings to 5-5-5 (giving you a theoretical extra 200mhz of memory speed to work with) as well as lowering the memory to run at DDR2 667mhz, giving you yet more room to work with.

After you've found your comfortable CPU overclock, you can tighten the memory speed and timings to whatever is stable.

 

[Joeflyer]

If your memory is capable of 4-4-4-12 timings at DDR2 800 then you do not need faster memory, up untill around 4ghz, if you want to go higher then that and your motherboard doesn't have lower dividers, only then would you need faster memory.

I'm thinking you may have not quite fully comprehended the importance of memory to your overclock.

When your overclocking the CPU, you need your memory to not be a limiting factor in that OC. This is why you reduce the timings to 5-5-5-15 instead of 4-4-4-12, because if memory is capable of 800mhz using 4-4-4-12 then that same memory theoreticaly is capable of 1000mhz using 5-5-5-12.

The other important factor is the FSB, seems you may not have realized overclocking the FSB in turn overclocks your memory as well as the CPU. This is why you loosen the timings to 5-5-5 (giving you a theoretical extra 200mhz of memory speed to work with) as well as lowering the memory to run at DDR2 667mhz, giving you yet more room to work with.

After you've found your comfortable CPU overclock, you can tighten the memory speed and timings to whatever is stable.

You are certainly correct in your assessment regarding my overclocking "expertise" I will have to mess around with the RAM speed and timings for sure.

Currently I have things stable at the following settings in BIOS:
AI Tuning: Manual
System Clocks: 100,100,100 and SPP<->MCP(Auto)
FSB MEM: Unlinked
FSB MEM Ratio: Auto(Actual- 1:1)
FSB(QDR): 1566
MEM DDR: 800Mhz (Actual 783.0Mhz)
5-5-5-15 2T
Advanced MEM settings: Auto on all(tRRD,tRC,tWR,tWTR,tREF,tRD,tRFC and Async Latency)
CPU Mutliplier: 9X
CPU N/2 Ratio: Disabled
EIS: Disabled
LDT Freq.: 5X
Vcore: 1.35(Actual: 1.32V)

SLI Broadcast Apeture: Auto(Have 2 Vid cards)
Nvidia GPU Ex: Enabled
SLI Ready MEM: Not Detected

Spread Spectrum Control: Disabled
CPUITC: Disabled
Limit CPUID Max Val: Disabled
C1E: Disabled
Execute Disabled Bit: Enabled
Virtualization Tech: Enabled

DDR Term. Voltage: 1.07V
MEM Voltage: 2.05(Actual: 2.09)
1.2V HT: Auto (Actual: 1.26)
NB: 1.40V
SB: Auto (Actual: 1.52)
CPU VTT: Auto (Actual: 1.26)

DDRII Cont. Ref. : Auto
DDRII " A Ref: Auto
DDRII " B Ref: Auto

I'm sure I didn't miss anything. Again, thanks for everyone's unput. It will get me wiser to the overclocking ways

 

[Joeflyer]

Here's an update: I adjusted the MEM DDR from 800Mhz to 500 MHZ and left the FSB MEM ratio on auto. I bumped up the FSB(QDR) in increments until reaching 1600 Mhz. Got successful posts each time.

I was pinched for time, so I didn't let Orthos run for very long....20 minutes tops, but ran through 1024k tests successfully and was running through 2-8K tests by the time I shut it down. So far, so good.

So, as I increase the FSB speed from this point, I will need to increase the MEM DDR freq. as well?

 

[blazed]

Different motherboards have different BIOs settings, ways of doing these things so I can't tell you for sure, never used your particular motherboard and BIOs.

I can tell you though that as long as your memory frequency is within its limits, the OC should be completly up to the CPU. You can use CPU-Z memory tab to check what your memorys effective speed and timings are.

What OC you up to now?

 

[chrispycrunch]

Am interested to see how far you can get. My buddy has that board and it is horrible for o/c - i think it's the SLI and that it is the 680i chipset.

 

[gigabit]

I just ordered a Evga 750i FTW.I hear this board OC's the E8400 prety well

 

[Joeflyer]

Different motherboards have different BIOs settings, ways of doing these things so I can't tell you for sure, never used your particular motherboard and BIOs.

I can tell you though that as long as your memory frequency is within its limits, the OC should be completly up to the CPU. You can use CPU-Z memory tab to check what your memorys effective speed and timings are.

What OC you up to now?

Sorry for taking so long to get back. Have been out doing actual flying this week instead of desk flying At any rate, I ended up resetting the CMOS,etc, and started over. I unlinked the RAM and manually set the timings to 5-5-5-18 22 2T, as prescribed by Corsair and bumped up the voltage on the RAM to 1.90 so far.
I have the CPU OC'd back up to 3.4Ghz and had run for 2 days stable prior to me having to leave on a trip. I will adjust the FSB higher when I get home and see if I can ease it back up to 3.5Ghz while leaving the RAM the same....or until it doesn't post. But, I really think this board may be the bottleneck.
Previously, when I had it OC'd to 3.6Ghz, I tried various RAM timings,freqs,etc, and nothing I tried provided a stable OC at that speed.It's quite possible that I will be stuck at 3.5Ghz when all is said and tried.