Need Q9550 Overclocking Help

[Azag]

I just built a new system and I am a noob to the overclocking society. I would like to overclock my system as much as possible and still keep my system stable. If anyone could give me some pointers about clock speed x bus and voltages I would greatly appreciate the help. Also how does my ram speed come into play? Is it important to run on a 1:2 ratio?

Q9550
EVGA 132-CK-NF78-A1 780i
OCZ Reaper HPC Edition 8GB 4x2GB DDR2 800
Air Cooled
Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro 92mm
Arctic Silver 5

Thanks in advance.

 

[karkas]

Run your memory at 1:1 while trying to OC. It reduces variables and generally makes life a little easier. When you get a stable OC you can play with RAM timings & speed.

On a side note are you having problems with memory in that mobo? I hear the NV mobos don't often like all memory slots populated...

 

[Azag]

I'm really not sure. I can't seem to get a stable config with anything over stock. I'm scratching my head here.

 

[mdamda]

Try bumping up the northbridge voltage by a bit to see if that helps.

 

[Azag]

I'm not actually sure which voltage is the NB. I have the following options in the voltages screen:

CPU Core: Auto Current Value: 1.31v
CPU FSB: Auto Current Value: 1.3v
Memory: 2.1v
nForce SPP: Auto Current Value: 1.4v
nforce MCP: Auto Current Value: 1.5v
HT nForce SPP <-> MCP: Auto Current Value: 1.2v

 

[redduc900]

nForce SPP = vNB
nForce MCP = vSB
HT nForce SPP <-> MCP = voltage for the HyperTransport bus connection between the NB and the SB.

If you haven't already, check out the 680i / 780i overclocking guide over in the EVGA 780i forum here...

http://www.evga.com/forums/tm.asp?m=222688

 

[Azag]

Thanks for the help to this point. I upped my cpu core voltages, nb, and sb a bit and ran prime95 while at work today. Everything ran fine for nearly 12 hours when I received "FATAL ERROR: Rounding was 0.5, expected less than 0.4"

I adjusted my voltages slightly upwards and im now running another prime95 test.

Is it common for for cores to run at 33 20 33 33? Why is the second core running so much cooler than the others? Is this a voltage problem?

 

[maddog39]

nForce SPP = vSB
nForce MCP = vNB
HT nForce SPP <-> MCP = voltage for the HyperTransport bus connection between the NB and the SB.

If you haven't already, check out the 680i / 780i overclocking guide over in the EVGA 780i forum here...

http://www.evga.com/forums/tm.asp?m=222688

That link was extremely helpful for getting my Q6600 OC working correctly, thanks alot. And I apologize for possibly bumping and old topic, but that link is a really useful resource.

 

[Kris]

Try running memtest. I had some bad ram when I built my Q9550 rig and I had a hard time getting stable @ stock. Ran some tests and found out my ram was defective from the get go. live and learn...