Need help overclocking my AMD FX-8320? -New Here-

[Dr. McCoy]

+1 to the previous.
You'll never see the chip's true potential with the current board you're using.
Think of a board as being the foundation of a home, if it's not up to task the rest gets affected in a bad way.

I will suggest grabbing a CHV-Z, Sabertooth 2.0 or 3.0 (Newer 3.0 with the LEDs under the PCI-E slot latches) for it, these boards are proven to handle an FX OC'ed - These will even run a 9590 chip OC'ed if anything will at all.

Start there and the rest will come along.

 

[Ozz1]

funny that eh , both boards have 8+2 phase power, other difference is the v-z has an extra 2 phase memory power, the guy isnt going for super duper overclocks from what i read, no reason what so ever i can see that this board wont handle a mild to moderate over clock for the extra gaming performance he wants to do, if anything is gunna let him down with it its gunna be his cooling
Extreme Engine Digi+ II :
- 8 + 2 phase power design
- 2 -phase Memory power design

 

[ShrimpBrime]

+1 to the previous.
You'll never see the chip's true potential with the current board you're using.
Think of a board as being the foundation of a home, if it's not up to task the rest gets affected in a bad way.

I will suggest grabbing a CHV-Z, Sabertooth 2.0 or 3.0 (Newer 3.0 with the LEDs under the PCI-E slot latches) for it, these boards are proven to handle an FX OC'ed - These will even run a 9590 chip OC'ed if anything will at all.

Start there and the rest will come along.

I do not agree with grabbing a new board suggestion unless it was a new platform like AM4 and DDR4 and he'll probably nearly double the frame rates he's getting now in game.

I do agree on the board choices for that platform FX-DDR3, but if this is a daily rig, might as well upgrade which I think he's gonna do at some point?

 

[Zerileous]

All I will say is that there is far more to a VRM than number of phases, as I'm not familiar with the specific hardware.

Daniel, do you have the VRM fan that was included with the board originally, if so is it in use? It should be. If not you could remove that plate and mount a larger / quieter fan above the VRM. With the liquid cooler you definitely need VRM airflow. If you haven't yet, you should check out this review by Dolk https://www.overclockers.com/asrock-990fx-extreme4/

Edit: Do note in his discussion of voltage and OC, he is dealing with Phenom CPUs, not FX.

 

[Ozz1]

All I will say is that there is far more to a VRM than number of phases, as I'm not familiar with the specific hardware.

Daniel, do you have the VRM fan that was included with the board originally, if so is it in use? It should be. If not you could remove that plate and mount a larger / quieter fan above the VRM. With the liquid cooler you definitely need VRM airflow. If you haven't yet, you should check out this review by Dolk https://www.overclockers.com/asrock-990fx-extreme4/

Edit: Do note in his discussion of voltage and OC, he is dealing with Phenom CPUs, not FX.

as i read it , seems to be this to me
I currently have an FX-8320, but plan to upgrade to an 8370 (open to other suggestions) in a few weeks and possibly a new MOBO - idk which one to go with yet, haven't looked very hard - anyway, in the time being I'd like to overclock my current CPU to get my feet wet in this ocean of overclocking and also use my new 1070 to more of its potential.

 

[ShrimpBrime]

All I will say is that there is far more to a VRM than number of phases, as I'm not familiar with the specific hardware.

Daniel, do you have the VRM fan that was included with the board originally, if so is it in use? It should be. If not you could remove that plate and mount a larger / quieter fan above the VRM. With the liquid cooler you definitely need VRM airflow. If you haven't yet, you should check out this review by Dolk https://www.overclockers.com/asrock-990fx-extreme4/

Edit: Do note in his discussion of voltage and OC, he is dealing with Phenom CPUs, not FX.

VRM shmeh. Did Dolk say Old L6717A voltage regulator?

If you want a fast FX processor you get them cold.

Any one with decent cooling should be able to pull off a 4.4ghz - 4.6Ghz overlock IMO. 1.45v give or take.

Here's is FX-8350 P-states for Cpu voltage reference.

Cpu FX-8350
# of P-States 7

P-State FID 0x1A - VID 0x0A - IDD 13 (21.00x - 1.425 V) 4.2ghz

P-State FID 0x19 - VID 0x0B - IDD 13 (20.50x - 1.412 V)

P-State FID 0x18 - VID 0x0E - IDD 12 (20.00x - 1.375 V)

P-State FID 0x12 - VID 0x16 - IDD 10 (17.00x - 1.275 V)

P-State FID 0xC - VID 0x1F - IDD 8 (14.00x - 1.162 V)

P-State FID 0x5 - VID 0x29 - IDD 5 (10.50x - 1.037 V)

P-State FID 0x10C - VID 0x33 - IDD 4 (7.00x - 0.912 V)

 

[Dr. McCoy]

I do not agree with grabbing a new board suggestion unless it was a new platform like AM4 and DDR4 and he'll probably nearly double the frame rates he's getting now in game.

I do agree on the board choices for that platform FX-DDR3, but if this is a daily rig, might as well upgrade which I think he's gonna do at some point?

Was only answering the post according to the subject.
If they should decide to upgrade the entire system a little later that's something for them to decide but since the OP question was help OC an FX chip that's how I went with it making suggestions.

I do agree though, if they are going to get another board may as well pony up and do it right with a Ryzen build but again with the cost of DDR4 they may say "Not right now" to that as well.

 

[Zerileous]

Shrimp, that's why I added the edit regarding his use of the Phenom II processors for his review. I mostly wanted to emphasize the impact of VRM cooling.

Dr. McCoy, 16GB of DDR4 is around $100 right now.

 

[ShrimpBrime]

Oh gotchas, I understand.
Yes DDr4 is finally becoming affordable lol.

 

[trents]

I certainly agree with the advice to either keep the current board, blow some air on the VRM and overclock the current CPU to somewhere arournd 4.5 ghz or just take that money that would have been spent on a Sabertooth and apply it toward more current technology. It doesn't make sense to me to spend that much on a used high end AM3+ to squeeze a few more fps out of the current rig. Besides, when you buy a used motherboard like that there is the risk of getting something that has problems. And with a high end overclocking board like the Sabertooth, chances are previous owner(s) have been reefing on it anyway.

 

[Kenrou]

I currently have an FX-8320, but plan to upgrade to an 8370 (open to other suggestions) in a few weeks and possibly a new MOBO - idk which one to go with yet, haven't looked very hard...

They are the same chip as far as i know, the 8320 is simply underclocked and sold cheaper. As to motherboards (again, as far as i know) there's only 3-4 that do the job "properly" when it comes to 5ghz+ OC, the Crosshair's, the Sabertooth's and i heard good things about the Gaming Aura (?) ?

 

[chrisjames61]

as i read it , seems to be this to me
I currently have an FX-8320, but plan to upgrade to an 8370 (open to other suggestions) in a few weeks and possibly a new MOBO - idk which one to go with yet, haven't looked very hard - anyway, in the time being I'd like to overclock my current CPU to get my feet wet in this ocean of overclocking and also use my new 1070 to more of its potential.

As someone who has over a dozen Piledriver 8 core chips and many more 6 and 4 core chips I would say upgrading from an 8320 to an 8370 is a TOTAL waste of money. You can get where you want to go overclocking the 8320 with a good board. The 8370 is faster stock but if you overclock the 8320 is in the same league. Because the 8370 is faster stock does not mean that it will be faster than the 8320 if you tweak them both. The 8320 will have more headroom from stock speeds than the 8370.

- - - Auto-Merged Double Post - - -

They are the same chip as far as i know, the 8320 is simply underclocked and sold cheaper. As to motherboards (again, as far as i know) there's only 3-4 that do the job "properly" when it comes to 5ghz+ OC, the Crosshair's, the Sabertooth's and i heard good things about the Gaming Aura (?) ?

Gaming Aura is a really good board. I have a Gen 1 Sabertooth, an R2 Sabertooth and a CH5FZ and the gaming aura is in the same league at least if you are air cooling.

 

[Daniel Rekkins]

That processor will never get to a place where it's not bottle necking that Gpu.

When you upgrade to a Ryzen (or Intel equivalent or faster), you will see tremendous gains with everything.

Ahh okay, well at least there's more to look forward to I guess... But now I really wanna rush a mobo and cpu upgrade asap lolol.

No, it doesn't apply to the board. You are at the boards imit on temp where you are now.
Your board does not qualify as a robust clocking board due to the lack of power phases it has.
FX draws big power and more phases is better. When your overclock goes up, so does the power draw. Your board has half the phases of a good board.
When you overdraw on a board, it blows up the VRM. Then board is no more. FX is good at that.

okay so does that mean I shouldn't try to push the cpu past 4.0GHz then? Do you think I could get it up to 4.2 safely?

 

[Mr.Scott]

I would not increase any voltage from this point on......but I would try to up the multi again and see how it goes.
Like I said, most FX's will do up to 4.4-4.5 on 1.4-1.45v.
Your results may vary, but I would still try. Anything you get is a bonus.

 

[Dr. McCoy]

Shrimp, that's why I added the edit regarding his use of the Phenom II processors for his review. I mostly wanted to emphasize the impact of VRM cooling.

Dr. McCoy, 16GB of DDR4 is around $100 right now.

Recently bought DDR4 for my present build and if you want the sutff that makes a Ryzen zippy you'll pay more than $100 for it.
However a nice set for Ryzen is this stuff: https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820232530
B die like you'd want and good timings, however there are even cheaper kits too.

If the OP should decide to go ahead and do a Ryzen build hey need to know you won't see massive MHz from it but you don't need it either - Ryzen is way more efficient than FX ever was.
I say this because the OP with his last indicated interest in a Ryzen so......

If the OP wants to we can make suggestions that will be good while not breaking the bank.

 

[trents]

Shrimp, that's why I added the edit regarding his use of the Phenom II processors for his review. I mostly wanted to emphasize the impact of VRM cooling.

Dr. McCoy, 16GB of DDR4 is around $100 right now.

https://www.amazon.com/Corsair-Veng...0mhz+16gb+kit&qid=1555894831&s=gateway&sr=8-6

I commonly see it for around $80 US lately. B die is more but that is not needed on FX systems and on many or most second generation builds these days.

 

[Dr. McCoy]

Agreed- You don't "Need" B die and the above is at an excellent price to say the least just to get a Ryzen setup going. I did say there were cheaper kits available - And there it is.
Until the OP states outright they want to do a Ryzen build that's all I'll mention about it on my part.

 

[Daniel Rekkins]

Geez, totally missed all the replies on this second page lol.

Thanks a ton for all the input and suggestions, this is crazy. I didn't think so many people would jump in to help out. First forum I've gone out and posted in that has had good engagement, couldn't be happier with the community and friendliness of everybody here. 10/10.

That being said, I did some math and figured out that I can afford to budget around $400-500 per month towards the new build if I take some money from other things for a few months to speed up the process. Didn't plan on pouring so much into this build but I'm excited now and don't really care anymore lol. This is too fun to wait another year or whatever to build a whole new rig.

Also 99% sure I'm gonna go with a Ryzen build. Glad I didn't just buy the 8370.

I also found the VRM, luckily I kept the box the motherboard came in. I don't think I've ever even seen this little fan in there before. Gonna install it later today after work. Been running Prime95 for about an hour and max temp on my CPU is 38c at 4.0ghz.

I think I'm also going to upgrade SSD's when I have to install Windows on the new board since my current SSD is only a 250gig.

But other than that, what all do you guys suggest knowing my current budget? I'd like to have everything built by August at the latest. So I think the budget is around $1500-2000 if I wait until August, but the sooner it can be built the better, as long as I'm not sacrificing too much performance by shaving off one extra month of saving.

 

[Johan45]

That budget is plenty for a new Ryzen build, new CPUs "should" be available by then as well so you could step right in to ZEN2. Hopefully the trend with DDR4 continues to lower the price.

 

[Zerileous]

Regarding the memory, you really want to be running 3200MHz or better on a Ryzen. You're not just overclocking the memory by doing this, but overclocking the "Infinity fabric" which includes the memory controller, but is also used for some of the cores to communicate. The link Dr. McCoy posted is the cheapest I've seen b-die ram (this refers to the actual ICs on the stick and is not advertised, however is inferred by certain combinations of frequency and timing).

These are considered the best DDR4 ICs and do really well with Ryzen, however if you're not benchmarking you probably won't notice a major difference. The 2400MHz sticks would probably leave some gaming performance on the table, but could be OK for a certain budget. The $100 3200MHz kits are the sweet spot for Ryzen right now, IMHO. Sniper-X are optimized to work well with Ryzen. You can also check on the G.Skill site using their "memory configurator" tool once you select a motherboard. I wouldn't necessarily advise buying a kit faster that 3200 either, as your CPU may not easily run them at XMP speeds, and the performance difference won't be substantial.