For your consideration "FX-8350 overclock"

[zebucity]

Hi fellas,

After some conversation with some of you, I have finished my primary overclock of my FX-8350. I have included a screen shot of the information you need to give me some feed back on what you think I could improve upon.

NOTE: SS was taken after an IBT. LLC is at Extreme.

The RAM voltage is at 1.515v I am unable to boot if I drop the CAS to 7 from 8. The RAM is rated at 1.5 so my one question is should i push it up voltage wise.

I look forward to reading your feedback on my current system specs.

Also I would like to thank those who gave feedback in my previous threads, and a special thanks to RGone for his OC results thread and general feedback.

-zeb

EDIT: Added CPU-Z SPD sheet for slot #3 & #4

 

[trents]

Looks great! I'd also run Prime95 blend on it for a couple of hours at least. The main concern I'd have would be the stability of the ram overclocked to that level with those timings. The P95 blend test really stresses the ram.

 

[RGone]

Looks very much together...

...Some good choices of parts and pieces it seems.

Swiftech H20-320 HD Edge with that as your cooling system instead of one of those mini-closed loop systems you got very good results with temps at your level of overclock. It just takes really good cooling to push these FX-series of processors.

It also looks like the GA990FXA-UD5 motherboard is a good step up from those cheaper 970 UD3 boards since the Vcore seems well in hand with a much better working LLC than has been seen on most of that cheaper series of motherboard.

The only thing that has become apparent is that DDR1866 ram is the least I would put in a BD or PD system now. I say that from how the bench results seem to lay out. I can run my Ares DDR1600 very close to DDR1900 but I doubt you can hit that ram speed using a 253 HT Ref/FSB. I have to run 233 to 236 FSB to keep my Ares DDR1600 in the DDR1800 to just almost DDR1900. That is a pretty good overclock on ram I think in todays ram market. I set my ram voltage to as close to 1.55V as I can get it to set and have not gone any higher since right at a DDR1900 nearly is enough of an overclock on DDR1600 ram for me and I personally don't see using 1.6V on ram spec'd for 1.5V. But there again, is a little more really worth it? In a benchmark? I wonder if one can see a real diffence in day to day use? I really doubt it overall.

I know my Video editting likes the 16gigs I put in it by combining my DDR1600 Ares with my DDR1866 Ares ram and running them at DDR1900.

So overall it looks like you stayed away from cheap and have a pretty good combination of parts that have resulted in a pretty doggone healthy system. Congrats man.
RGone...

 

[zebucity]

Thanks for the feedback guys. In regards to your comment RGone, I did notice a limitation on the FSB with the 1600 Ram. If I could do it over again, I would have gone with 1866 or higher and reduced the clock so that it gave me more flexibility with the systems handlers. With Ram being so cheap these days, I may just sell this 1600 and look for some low timing 2100. By doing so I think I could reduce the FSB to the 240ish and increase the HT and NB as well as the multiplier. A different approach to an overclock.

The only question is, will it blend? No that isn't the question. The question really is, how much of an increase will I see from a NB and HT upped by 100 - 200 MHz and Ram up by 200-400 MHz.

The current CineBench test results are 8.20. Is that limited by the Ram, NB, HT? I don't know but if I can sell this Ram and off set the cost of some 2100 so I only pay 50 bucks...I intend to find out.

-zeb

 

[RGone]

Okay I went back to my thread about does Piledriver nose dive after 4.3Ghz like the Bulldozer did and got this image of my FX-8350 running as I always did using Gskil Ares DDR1866 ram.

Note on my CHV I always run the CPU_NB and the HT frequency at the same speed and usually between 2550Mhz and 2600Mhz. Been doing such and still do such. Am doing the same now on the Fatal1ty board I borrowed and am testing. For those that cannot do such, I am sorry. I can and do.

Your 8.20 vs my 8.25 is not much but it is what it is. If CineB was giving scores in the thousands like so many do, then the difference would "look" greater for sure. But when using single digits to report a score and rounded to the nearest hundreth, I expect the performance difference to be pretty hefty. Not astronomical but an increase for sure.

I bought two 8gig kits of Ares DDR2133 and sent one to C_D for something I owed him. He is just astounded by his performance increase over his wonky Crucial DDR1600. He had had to settle on 4.3Ghz with his FX-8120 but the faster ram made running 4.4Ghz a worthwhile move. However the Ares DDR2133 8gig kits I bought are more on the order of $64 Usd since I got this model of Ares.:
G.SKILL Ares Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 2133 (PC3 17000) Desktop Memory Model F3-2133C9D-8GAB That is some neat ram to me in that it is rated to run DDR2133 with fairly tight timings at 1.65V...BUT it is also rated to run at DDR1866 at only 1.5V. Paid a little more than what they want for the cheaper Ares stuff that is gold colored, but I wound up with very flexible ram for sure.

Now I can run this particular DDR2133 in combination with my DDR1866 kit and do so at DDR2010 at only 1.55V and now have 16gigs of ram. That is not to say other ram cannot act the same, but I am saying this is how my Gskil Ares acts for me.
RGone...

 

[zebucity]

Thanks for the info update RGone. You have raised one question for me, which is, I was under the impression that AMD systems ran better with less Ram sticks. ie. 16GB ram 2x8 > 4x4. I read it some where, I can't remember, but that is the impression I have had for a while now.

After your previous comment I looked on Newegg and found this kit. http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231571

I specifically picked this one;

a)G.skill
b)1.6v rated
c) 2x8 rather than 4x4

 

[RGone]

@ "zebucity", I have no experience with that ram at all. I have seen a few here lately with 8gig sticks that did not fare so well. However I read the user reviews at the Egg and see one user with a CHV-z board runnig the ram without issue.

There are all sorts of rumors by those that cannot do X that label the situation as un-doable. I had 4x4 of mis-matched kits of ram by speed that I tested all the way to 5.2Ghz without any problem on my CHV board. 16gigs in 4 sticks. So it varies.

I would expect that ram you looked at to do okay. Whether it will get along with your mobo is open to the seeing. Sometimes some ram just does not like a system. I would expect it to work okay though since I saw that user on CHV-z reporting A-okay.
RGone...

 

[trents]

Two sticks puts less strain on the IMC than four, all other things being equal. Get the low voltage stuff if you can, 1.5 vs 1.6+.

 

[RGone]

Seeing how tight he is running his current ram I am supposing he wants the tightest ram he can get for an AMD system.
Here is the page showing all the 2x8 -16 gigs of ram that NewEgg has for sale at this time. You cannot get that tighter Cas 9 timing in any ram not rated for at least 1.6V.

 

[ssjwizard]

If your going to run 4x sticks of high speed ram just up the CPU-NB volts a notch and raise the RAM voltage a little bit and the instability goes away usually. 2X sticks does indeed lower the strain on the CPUs IMC and makes tighter timings easier to achieve, however, current 8GB offerings dont exactly come with the strictest timings around. This is more of a personal decision.

If you want the tightest timings at a high frequency use 2Gb or 4Gb sticks, if you want the best memory density at a decent low voltage go for 8Gb sticks.

 

[zebucity]

Thanks for the info fellas, I have one final question. It is regarding RAM speed with this board.

The following comes from my MoBo Qualified Vendors List.

"Only one DIMM per channel is supported for DDR3-1866MHz and higher speed as using an AM3+ CPU"

http://download.gigabyte.us/FileList/Memory/memory_ga-990fxa-ud5.pdf

 

[ssjwizard]

Basically what it means is they dont certify that it will run 4x sticks at 1866 or higher. AMD rates the IMC at 1 stick per channel and gigabyte is not sticking there neck out to claim it will work anyways. The truth is it probably will work just fine, but you may need to increase a few voltages just a touch.

 

[zebucity]

Thanks, ssjwizard that settles it. Anyone want to buy 2x8GB 1600 G.Skill Ares?

 

[trents]

Thanks, ssjwizard that settles it. Anyone want to buy 2x8GB 1600 G.Skill Ares?

This would be appropriate for the Classified section of the forum but I think you have to have 100 posts to have access to buying and selling there. IMO it can be difficult to move stuff there and you probably will get more interest on ebay unless you have something that is really in demand by the overclocking community itself.

 

[zebucity]

unless you have something that is really in demand by the overclocking community itself.

A collection if self portrait internet memes?