"CPU Level Up" w 980x on Rampage 3 Extreme

[Jay Riffs]

im RTFMing... "Thermal Interface material is toxic. DO NOT eat the Thermal Interface material."

damn..always wanted to eat it : /

 

[kayson]

im RTFMing... "Thermal Interface material is toxic. DO NOT eat the Thermal Interface material."

damn..always wanted to eat it : /

lol. what TIM are you using? I wouldn't use the stock goop for anything. Get yourself some Arctic Silver 5 or IC Diamond 7

 

[Jay Riffs]

the one comming with noctua coolers. NT-H1. the linus guy from the videos says its a pretty good one, ill have to take his word for it now that i applied it

im still screwing the pc together.. im slow like a snail lol .. also the board is huge and full of wonderous things i never seen

ill finish this cookie and get back to screwing.. cya in a bit

 

[Jay Riffs]

im in bios now.. stuffs glowing in pretty lights on the mobo and other devises lol wish had a case with window and in a visible place

 

[kayson]

im in bios now.. stuffs glowing in pretty lights on the mobo and other devises lol wish had a case with window and in a visible place

Before you start OCing double check your temps to make sure your HS is seated well. Just in case lol

 

[Jay Riffs]

god dammit i got HORRIBLE problems with OCZ revodrive. it just wont see the damn thing, and installing the drivers doesnt help at all. retried 20 times and tried other stuff.. at first it WAS seeing the drive as i had it in a different slot, now it doesnt and yes it has the green dot :/

update: if the revodrive is in the first 16x PCIe slot then it kindly offers its RAID setup Mini-BIOS ..right now ima see if windows can see the drive now.. F YEAH!

after FOUR FKIN HOURS.. and i totally fixed it myself

building PC is much more like sex then i thought. not only you must fk with the system, its also satisfying when you acchieve something.

anyway, for the generations to follow: i dont know wtf that bug i had was exactly, but on rampage 3 extreme, if the system doesnt see your RevoDrive, INSTALL THE REVODRIVE INTO THE FIRST PCI-E 16x SLOT, and your videocard to the second (not sure about the card actually, but revodrive must go into the first slot for damn sure)

then follow the regular "drivers from USB" installation

 

[Jay Riffs]

hm fkin revodrive.. one time it works, one time doesnt.. mostly does after i take it out and put back in :S anyone got a clue?

 

[jason4207]

I'd leave all of the voltages on auto except the cpu and ram voltage and anything else in the guide I don't remember off the top of my head. Those you want to manually set at the default levels and only increase it when you get unstable. You also want to set your clocks manually, obviously.

Do you really want to leave uncore, vtt, and QPI on auto? Won't they get bumped up to dangerous levels if left on auto as you raise BCLK?

I've got no direct experience w/ i7, but just wanted to make sure for the sake of the OP, and anyone else reading.

 

[Jay Riffs]

didnt wanna raise bclck, just the cpu mult and voltages if necessary.

but good info for a noob- when i think of it now, AUTO doesnt automatically mean SAFE..

about the revodrive: since it seems to be defect and/or incompatible, I´ve RMA it and just bought a crucial300 128 GB from my local store. many people seem to be having compatibility or other problems with the revodrives, especially with the ones which look like mine (and it looks like drunk junkies trying themselves at modern art assembled it at gunpoint in some badly lit room in a soviet gulag during an earthquake). and the infamous green dot sticker didnt help, either.

even as a newb i can safely say that there was something reeeeally messed up with it. it was just total randomness and weird, weird bugs all over the place.. oh and it was missing one SCREW, literally. one of the screws holding the circuit on the PCIe slot backshield or whatever you call it. generally, ive paid about a day of my time and 600 euro for betatesting the drive and finding out that its in beta stage lol. thanks god they ll give me a refund.

DONT BUY THE REVODRIVE, at least just yet.

 

[kayson]

Do you really want to leave uncore, vtt, and QPI on auto? Won't they get bumped up to dangerous levels if left on auto as you raise BCLK?

I've got no direct experience w/ i7, but just wanted to make sure for the sake of the OP, and anyone else reading.

I think that would be bios dependent? I don't see why a bios would automatically raise voltages as you raise clock speeds, but it definitely couldn't hurt to manually set them to their default values.

 

[Jay Riffs]

talking about defautl values: somehow in my BIOS (with latest updates etc.) i cant set memory to exactly 1.65v because it only allows 0.0650 increments. i can set some value just slightly under 1.65v of course. should that do?

auto settings at which im running it right now (was busy with windows, didnt OC yet) are 1066 clock (while the kit is meant for 1333) and about 1.5v, so its undervolted/underclocked

will raising it to 1333 and 1.65v give me some real world performance gain?

might i experience more stability issues at this clock/voltage then on 1333/1.65v?

im really dont mind benchmarks, just noticeable real world performance.

 

[Bobnova]

Undervolting can cause instability, but it won't actually hurt it.
A touch above or below 1.65 isn't a big deal. You can always bump VTT slightly if the ram goes over 1.65.

 

[kayson]

talking about defautl values: somehow in my BIOS (with latest updates etc.) i cant set memory to exactly 1.65v because it only allows 0.0650 increments. i can set some value just slightly under 1.65v of course. should that do?

auto settings at which im running it right now (was busy with windows, didnt OC yet) are 1066 clock (while the kit is meant for 1333) and about 1.5v, so its undervolted/underclocked

will raising it to 1333 and 1.65v give me some real world performance gain?

might i experience more stability issues at this clock/voltage then on 1333/1.65v?

im really dont mind benchmarks, just noticeable real world performance.

I have the same voltage issue. Mine's running slightly above 1.65 with no issues. And if your memory is rated for 1333, you can definitely run it at 1333. When you're overclocking, you're gonna do all of your components separately anyways (bclk/memory/cpu) so chances are your memory will be at or above 1333 when you finish.

 

[Jay Riffs]

uuuhm btw., shouldnt i raise bclck untill memory gets to 1333 (while giving it enough voltage to run good), and THEN use the unlocked CPU multiplier to OC just the CPU more??

 

[Draizien]

You should not need to raise the Bclock from its default value in order to have your memory running at 1333, you just have to change the memory multiplier.

 

[kayson]

You should not need to raise the Bclock from its default value in order to have your memory running at 1333, you just have to change the memory multiplier.

+1. Your stock bclk is 133.3. A multiplier of 10 (technically 5 because its double clocked but whatever) gets you 1333.

Essentially what your process should be is: drop your multipliers so you can max your bclk without worrying about cpu or memory stability. Then once you know what your max bclk is, you start lower than that, and increase the memory frequency by increasing bclk and memory multiplier slowly. If your memory hits its stability ceiling before you reach your max bclk, then you stay at that bclk and memory frequency. If you reach your max bclk, then you stick with that memory frequency because the bclk can't go any higher.

 

[Jay Riffs]

hm ok.. ima start soon then *takes a deep breath*

jsut one final question before i burn it to hell: what is a good bclck to aim for in my case (on my system, for a good compromise between lifespan and performance)

just give me some "I´d aim for somewhere around that if I were you"-value

 

[Jay Riffs]

hm nevermind that.. already on my way there.. now watching out for temps.

this is why tell me please:

- whats a good full-load temp for the 980x,? ("good" meaning "will allow me to load it for years and wont die anytime soon

- is IOH temp of 60 celsius on load a good one?

- what is CPU PLL and why does it want 1.8v by default? i googled much, but nowher eit actually says wtf CPU PLL is
and why is CPU PLL at 1.8?

 

[kayson]

hm nevermind that.. already on my way there.. now watching out for temps.

this is why tell me please:

- whats a good full-load temp for the 980x,? ("good" meaning "will allow me to load it for years and wont die anytime soon

- is IOH temp of 60 celsius on load a good one?

- what is CPU PLL and why does it want 1.8v by default? i googled much, but nowher eit actually says wtf CPU PLL is
and why is CPU PLL at 1.8?

I'd say 80 load is probably the highest I'd run 24/7. Since you won't be at 80C all the time its not a huge deal.

IOH is the northbridge temperature (I think). Again, the sensors are very inaccurate, but north bridges tend to run pretty hot. 60C should be fine. If you're really concerned, you can probably replace the TIM on the heatsink because I'm guessing they use some pretty bad stuff to save money.

PLL = phase locked loop and its the feedback loop that sets the cpu frequency. Quick research says that 1.8V is fine. And PLLs are power hungry little buggers so I'm not surprised.

For voltages in general, check out this guide: Link. I've looked through it briefly and it seems pretty solid but read at your own discretion.

 

[Jay Riffs]

blast it, if i OC it to 4Ghz, it doesnt crash, but after 20 mins prime95 it gets as high as 90 degrees Celsius, which i really do not like. its not at 90 degrees all the time, but it does reach that after a while. and i like this new machine too much to torture it like that.

im considering just turning all the automated stuff on and letting it run with C1E, turbo, C-State etc instead of putting it at danger of running at 90 degrees. at least it will live long and not run hot as hell. and its ultra quiet btw., i barely hear my pc at all.

i might try finding some good settings later on, and/or replacing my fan/thermal compound to something less quiet and more performance-oriented, but tomorrow work calls so for now i ll have to leave it at auto and finish installing my work programs i guess.

thanks to everyone, especially kayson, for answering my stupid questions <3
even if i didnt greatly OC my pc for now, the knowledge i gained reading the forum and tinkering around will serve me well. at least im not afraid changing sinister numbers in BIOS now