Intel Core i5-2500k OC - Help a Newb (LGA1155, P8Z68-V LX v4105)

[LarmanW]

Hi People,

I hope someone can give me some easy directions. I have been poking at the BIOS settings on my ASUS LGA1155 with BIOS P8Z68-V LX version 4105 but so far the 'BCLK' set to 100 and 'BY ALL CORES' set to 45 won't stick. Video's I have seen on youtube don't help as the bios version in the vids are a little different. BCLK always reverts to 103 and BY ALL CORES drops to 42. Not sure how to get them to stick. Please be gentle to this old newb. Let me know what info and screen shots that I can provide if it will help sort this out.

Thanks,
LarmanW

 

[LarmanW]

Hi People,

I hope someone can give me some easy directions. I have been poking at the BIOS settings on my ASUS LGA1155 with BIOS P8Z68-V LX version 4105 but so far the 'BCLK' set to 100 and 'BY ALL CORES' set to 45 won't stick. Video's I have seen on youtube don't help as the bios version in the vids are a little different. BCLK always reverts to 103 and BY ALL CORES drops to 42. Not sure how to get them to stick. Please be gentle to this old newb. Let me know what info and screen shots that I can provide if it will help sort this out.

Thanks,
LarmanW

I figured out the sig but still no clue why it is maxing out at 42 when I try to set it to 45.

 

[trents]

I would not change the BCLK. I would only work with the multiplier. You may need to disable Turbo in order to manually raise the multiplier past the turbo speed.

 

[LarmanW]

I would not change the BCLK. I would only work with the multiplier. You may need to disable Turbo in order to manually raise the multiplier past the turbo speed.

Thanks. I tried that and first try manually, it actually dropped my clocking to 3.9ish. I tried tweaking the voltage to 1.35 but it showed it as 1.165 and in the open field was 0.635 in red. When I tried that, OC would fail and put me back into the bios to fix. I tried undoing a few things but no go. Finally, I went to EZ Mode and picked the optimum and it boots but only gets 4199.02MHz and shows the multiplier as 42.0 (in CPU-Z).

Is there a step by step guide that relates to my bios that will get me up to 45? I have already rebooted various setups about 20times since yesterday trying to get something close to that.

 

[trents]

I don't know of any step by step guides for particular motherboard bioses. You might find a tutorial that will pertain to overclocking the Sandy Bridge K CPUs. Are you sure you have the 2500k and not the 2500? That technology is old enough now that a lot of guys who overclocked those back in the day have forgotten the details.

Have you done any temp monitoring at 4.2 ghz when stress testing?

 

[Zerileous]

Did you adjust the max power duration limit? What about disabling speedstep and C states? Just lifting some stuff from our guides still stickied in this forum. No first hand experience but check these out: https://www.overclockers.com/forums...Beginners-How-to-set-your-25-6-700K-to-4-5Ghz and https://www.overclockers.com/forums...ng-2500K-trying-to-understand-weird-behaviour.

 

[LarmanW]

I don't know of any step by step guides for particular motherboard bioses. You might find a tutorial that will pertain to overclocking the Sandy Bridge K CPUs. Are you sure you have the 2500k and not the 2500? That technology is old enough now that a lot of guys who overclocked those back in the day have forgotten the details.

Have you done any temp monitoring at 4.2 ghz when stress testing?

Yes, it is 2500K. That is confirmed in CPU-Z display and RealTemp. I just did a bit of stress testing and only got up to about ~70 ° bit was first trying to get beyond 4.2GHz but then messed things up and had to go back.

I might try some more stuff later today if I get my other chores done.

- - - Auto-Merged Double Post - - -

Did you adjust the max power duration limit? What about disabling speedstep and C states? Just lifting some stuff from our guides still stickied in this forum. No first hand experience but check these out: https://www.overclockers.com/forums...Beginners-How-to-set-your-25-6-700K-to-4-5Ghz and https://www.overclockers.com/forums...ng-2500K-trying-to-understand-weird-behaviour.

I did not see the max power duration limit in my BIOS. Would it go by any other names? I did try disabling speedstep and C3, C6. Thanks for the links, I will go check them out.

 

[trents]

It's a 4+2 power phase design motherboard with no heat sink on the VRM.

 

[Zerileous]

0-70 Safe
70-80 Safe. Attempt to lower the temperature
80-90 Approaching unsafe levels
90-100 Dangerously hot

If you're hitting 70c at 4.2GHz you're not going to make 4.5GHz unless that was also at 1.35V, then you're still borderline. What kind of CPU cooling do you have? Has the thermal paste been replaced ever? What about case airflow? As trents alluded to what about VRM temps? Is your voltage stable?

 

[trents]

According to his Sig, looks like he has a CM Hyper 212.

 

[LarmanW]

If you're hitting 70c at 4.2GHz you're not going to make 4.5GHz unless that was also at 1.35V, then you're still borderline. What kind of CPU cooling do you have? Has the thermal paste been replaced ever? What about case airflow? As trents alluded to what about VRM temps? Is your voltage stable?

I am at idling at about 58° when at 4200.03MHz. Not sure about voltage. Is there a tool in windows that will reveal the voltages? My cooling is Cooler Master Hyper 212 RGB Black Edition. I did put the cooling paste that came with the cooler kit. Air flow is probably average for the case. Things are not that tightly spaced. I'm not sure what VRM is.

The reason I started poking around with this OC is that my system did get a thermal check - was running in high 90's. I reset the OC to the lowest EZ setting in the bios and was able to come back up. I then also replaced the paste on the stock fan but also ordered the Cooler Master. Once I got the Cooler Master installed, I thought I would explore getting a bit more performance. I don't think the current settings are ideal, though, as my Firefox occasionally goes into a wierd mode where it allows me to enter stuff and switch tabs and whatever but it ignores everything I do. I usually reboot and it is ok afterwards. So I think I do need to tweak it to some sweet spot but as I said in the header, I am a newb.

Core voltage from CPU-Z shows 1.304V.

 

[trents]

VRM = Voltage Regulation Module. The VRM handles the power delivery to the CPU and Memory. Here are a couple of pics. Keeping the VRM cool is important in overclocking. Heat sinks facilitate this.

 

[Zerileous]

re: monitoring voltage, please refer to the guide linked above for monitoring tools. Idle temps usually don't mean a whole lot, but 58 is up there. I would remove your side panel and see if that greatly decreases temps. If it does then you know that case airflow is the problem.

 

[trents]

Yes, I was thinking that the idle temp was abnormally high as well. I would also pull the cooler and check the pattern of the thermal paste spread to make sure there is good contact. Those CM Hyper 212 Evo mounting systems are difficult to work with.

 

[LarmanW]

re: monitoring voltage, please refer to the guide linked above for monitoring tools. Idle temps usually don't mean a whole lot, but 58 is up there. I would remove your side panel and see if that greatly decreases temps. If it does then you know that case airflow is the problem.

Taking the side panel off drops the temps by about 6 degrees to 52 deg, idling. Is that enough to worry about case airflow?

- - - Auto-Merged Double Post - - -

Yes, I was thinking that the idle temp was abnormally high as well. I would also pull the cooler and check the pattern of the thermal paste spread to make sure there is good contact. Those CM Hyper 212 Evo mounting systems are difficult to work with.

Speaking of paste. Was wondering if there's a go to paste that works best compared to what came with the CM kit?

 

[trents]

Concerning "go to" thermal paste, there are a lot of good choices and you will get a wide range of answers on this. Personally, I use AC MX4 because it is high quality and economical. It also has no curing time like Arctic Silver 5 does. All the name brand products are within a degree or two of each other performance wise. I buy the 20 gm tubes of MX4 and it lasts me a long time.

If your temps drop 6c with the side panel off you have an airflow problem. But even 52c is not where you should be. You should be 8-12c cooler than that at idle. Something's not right. What program are you measuring temps with?

 

[LarmanW]

Concerning "go to" thermal paste, there are a lot of good choices and you will get a wide range of answers on this. Personally, I use AC MX4 because it is high quality and economical. It also has no curing time like Arctic Silver 5 does. All the name brand products are within a degree or two of each other performance wise. I buy the 20 gm tubes of MX4 and it lasts me a long time.

If your temps drop 6c with the side panel off you have an airflow problem. But even 52c is not where you should be. You should be 8-12c cooler than that at idle. Something's not right. What program are you measuring temps with?

So, what's the cure for airflow? Measuring with RealTemp gave the stated temps of 58 with cover on and 52 cover off. With Speedfan, I just checked, is showing CPU 40C, Cores hover between 50-54c.

 

[trents]

First, you have to know what temp is actually being reported. "CPU" often refers to a sensor in the socket area that is heavily influenced by VRM temp, which is often higher than actual processor core temps. The two temp terms that are more indicative of what is actually happening with the processor are "package temp" ( a measure of the temp somewhere under the lid of the processor" and "core temp" which refers to the processor cores. Another important temp is the "VRMOS" or just MOS which reports the temps of the "mosfets", one of the three components which make up the Voltate Regulation Module, and the one that really is the only one of the three components of the VRM you have to worry about as they can blow if they get too hot.

If I were you, I would download and install the free program "HWInfo64" which gives you much more information than the ones you are currently using.

 

[Zerileous]

I would just use the stuff that came with the 212, it won't make a big difference. Is there dust in the CPU cooler? I second re-applying the thermal paste to give that a go. It's debatable since the death of IDE cables, but I'm still a fan of cable management for improving airflow as well. Otherwise it's down to number of and position of fans. What case are you using and where are the fans located?

 

[LarmanW]

I would just use the stuff that came with the 212, it won't make a big difference. Is there dust in the CPU cooler? I second re-applying the thermal paste to give that a go. It's debatable since the death of IDE cables, but I'm still a fan of cable management for improving airflow as well. Otherwise it's down to number of and position of fans. What case are you using and where are the fans located?

Haven't had much time to do anything today - work is madness! My case is Thermaltake Dokker, which is fairly roomy. I have a fan on powersupply, one upper back and one on the Nvidia GeForce card inside the case. I think I might be able to drop the Nvidea down to the bottom slot which would give more clearance from the CPU. Would that be a good idea? The Cooler Master is dust-free and with new paste. I just bought it a couple of days ago. I could also clean up the cables a bit but I don't see that they are that bad.

Had Firefox go phantom on me again today and just while idling at 54c with the case side open. It just accepts my input but just ignores it. I need to reboot the PC to get it back to normal. I did recently install Facebook Container Plugin for Firefox, so maybe that is causing that issue? Probably not, as I did try Chrome before the reboot and the network was gone there too but it at least tried

- - - Auto-Merged Double Post - - -

First, you have to know what temp is actually being reported. "CPU" often refers to a sensor in the socket area that is heavily influenced by VRM temp, which is often higher than actual processor core temps. The two temp terms that are more indicative of what is actually happening with the processor are "package temp" ( a measure of the temp somewhere under the lid of the processor" and "core temp" which refers to the processor cores. Another important temp is the "VRMOS" or just MOS which reports the temps of the "mosfets", one of the three components which make up the Voltate Regulation Module, and the one that really is the only one of the three components of the VRM you have to worry about as they can blow if they get too hot.

If I were you, I would download and install the free program "HWInfo64" which gives you much more information than the ones you are currently using.

Thanks for the explanation. I can barely see my VRMs from the side of the case, I'll need to take another look with the case on a bench but I don't think there would be any room for heat sinks for the VRMs, unfortunately, but I'll take a peak when I get a bit of time. Busy week today and ahead, so I might not find time. Also want to give the HWInfo64 a try to get some better details.