New to OC, AMD Athlon II X4 635 help

[RGone]

YO Neutrolizer on topic.

Bios first set to Optimized Defaults.

THEN: Below.

Vcore set to 1.425Volts CPUNB set to 1.25Volts

Ram set to 9, 9, 9, 24 and 1.55Volts

Ram divider set to run ram at DDR 800 speed.

200x14.5 = 2900Mhz stock speed. Test 20 mins P95 (OCCT). Pass / Fail. TELL US the results and do NOT change settings other than those specified above. It should pass.

210x14.5 = 3045Mhz overclock. Test 20 mins with P95 (OCCT) IF it should fail then change NOTHING but the Vcore and up it one notch and retest. This 210x14.5 should also pass. No way to know but should.

215x14.5 = 3117Mhz overclock. Test 20 mins with P95 (OCCT). My guess is it should still pass. If it does not check the Memory TAB of CPUz and see what the Cpu Frequency is showing. Let us see if it more than 533. If not over 533, then add another notch of Vcore and REtest with P95 (OCCT).

220x TEST fail check ram speed for close to 533. Hopefully you have not failed and Vcore is still 1.425V

225x TEST fail check ram speed for close to 533. Hopefully you have not failed and Vcore is still 1.425V

230x TEST fail check ram speed for close to 533. Hopefully you have not failed and Vcore is still 1.425V

235x TEST fail check ram speed for close to 533. Hopefully you have not failed and Vcore is still 1.425V

240x14.5 = right at 3500Mhz and that is where "trents" said his 630 would run with 1.425Vcore [no more than 1.475]. IF you make it to this point it may well be a good stopping point until real DDR1333 or DDR1600 1.5Volt ram is in the slots. I would TEST this 240x14.5 for two hours as it is reallly a good stopping point with the ram you have. Otherwise you have to start upping ram voltage is my guess.

If the tests above seem to pass without drama and fan-fare and all that shett, then do the 3 CPUz captures and OCCT or whatever you tested with and post the captures. So we can see just where in the world we are.

 

[trents]

Yeah that sounds good about starting from scratch. I was looking at the specs for my MOBO and it said this for Memory Standards: "1866(OC)/1333/1066" so does that mean I cant use DDR3 1600 or is the 1600 OC'd to 1866? Yes to both, most likely.

Also what does VRM mean? http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=...2UFvnXuZ5NXPZ11eQ&sig2=urNY6xLLU3DZyISEaoHR4A

I think it might be even more important to add sinks to the "mosfets" as they are the most likely motherboard component to fry. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOSFET

http://www.sidewindercomputers.com/enmofocomohe.html

trents, what do you mean by "
Did you mean that after I bump up the vcore and run Prime95 that I should increase my FSB by another 5 mhz and keep adding more vcore but stop before I reach 55 C? Yes

I would love to upgrade my memory and if I do buy some, it will probably take a week or two. I would also be very thankful if you guys continue to teach me the fine art of tuning my computer as I would very much love to learn how. Now the question is should I continue to experiment with my current memory as a learning experience or wait a week or two? It is very clear that I am going to continue depending on you guys for your expertise!

 

[Neutrolizer]

Alright so its a thumbs up to buy ddr 1600 memory?

ALso what do you guys think about this for mosfet HS: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835708016

couple reviews at bottom listed the same mobo as me but i guess its a tight fit.

anyways just ran OCCT overnight and wanted to post it. the bios was changed to optimal. I will get to your instructions in a bit RGone

 

[Neutrolizer]

I just tried changing my bios and it wouldn't boot with those settings. I turned the ram timings back to auto and it booted. My computer just doesn't like something about those numbers. Should I continue to run OCCT without the ram timings? Everything else is set to what you specified. CPUNB is set to 1.24 and ram set to 1.54 v since they change at .02 intervals. Thanks

 

[RGone]

Forget my instructions. You ran OCCT overnite for 8 hours and passed but showed 3 captures of CPUz showing the CPU tab all three times. Not the CPU tab, the Memory tab and the SPD tab. So no clue what the ram timings were that were being used when OCCT passed 8 hours. No clue what the ram speed or actual voltages were when OCCT ran for 8 hours and passed. No real idea what the ram settings will be when you would have begun to try and up the FSB by 10 to 210x14.5 or any of the next jumps in FSB during which the ram speed will automatically jump.

It is obvious that I am loosing my writing skills. I am going to take a break.

 

[Neutrolizer]

It is obvious that I am loosing my writing skills.

lol good one

anyways thats my bad, I uploaded the wrong CPUZ screenshot.

 

[trents]

Those timings are appropriate for the ram running at 533/1066 but the frequency of the ram will climb as you increase the fsb so at some point you will need to relax the timings if the bios doesn't respond appropriately on "Auto". Set your overclock mode to manual and "Asynchronous".

 

[trents]

Alright so its a thumbs up to buy ddr 1600 memory?

Thumbs up. The 1600 mhz ram will at minimum run legitimately at 1333 mhz on low voltage and tight timings. Your CPU's ICM won't take much more than 1333 mhz so it should be a good match.

ALso what do you guys think about this for mosfet HS: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835708016

couple reviews at bottom listed the same mobo as me but i guess its a tight fit.

Worth a try, anyway, for $15.

anyways just ran OCCT overnight and wanted to post it. the bios was changed to optimal. I will get to your instructions in a bit RGone

 

[Neutrolizer]

Alrighty will order soon then. Anyways guess i'll learn or gain some experience in this. I bumped up the FSB to 210 with the vcore at 1.425, CPUNB voltage to 1.425, DRAM voltage to 1.54 and lowered the memory clock x4

 

[trents]

CPUNB voltage is 1.425? That's dangerously high! I would not exceed 1.3 and 1.25 seems to be plenty most of the time. Lower your HT Link. It will quickly create instability if you overclock it by much at all. Try to keep it between 1800 and 2000 mhz. Let CPUNB rise to 2400-2500 mhz.

Looks like you decided to depart from the incremental approach I outlined in an earlier post where I advised to see how far you could get on stock voltage before failing Prime95. You jumped right to 1.425 vcore!

 

[Neutrolizer]

Oh sorry, meant to post 1.24 voltage for CPUNB!

Yeah vcore is up to 1.425 because RGone mentioned that earlier due to you having the athlon II 630 and OCing up that high with similar voltage. Before I went up to 1.55 v for vcore and had no issues with overheating. Just doing this until the better memory comes in.

 

[trents]

I was more concerned with having you practice the "discipline" of proper overclocking technique as someone new to the art than I was the actual vcore amount of 1.425. The four principles of good oveclocking technique are: 1. Make gradual changes, 2. Change only one parameter at a time (or at least no more at a time than is necessary) so that if instability sets in you have a pretty good idea what caused it, 3. monitor for temps and voltages and 4. test thoroughly for stability. Having said that, with experience you can usually jump start the process to a point so that it's not so tedious and protracted but guard against impatience as it gets stuff fried.

Concerning temps, you will remember that over the weekend there was not a problem with processor temps but there was likely a problem with motherboard components overheating when you were throwing lots of vcore on the system. 1.425 vcore worked okay on my system to get my Propus 630 to 3.5 ghz and I doubt that amount of voltage will cause you board component overheating problems. My intention in throwing out the 1.425 vcore figure was not to give you ready-made "plug and play" numbers but a reference point as you gradually added frequency and voltage to find what was best for your system and it's own combination of components.

 

[Neutrolizer]

Alright I understand, I'll back it down and do it right!

 

[Neutrolizer]

Hey there I'm back. Looking at ram and I was wondering if it says this for features: "For Dual Channel DDR3 for AMD Phenom and Intel Core i3, i5 and processors," would that work for my CPU AMD Athlon by chance?

Anyways back to the OC, I did tests after every 5 FSB increase and at 240 FSB it crashed my computer when running OCCT. I then increased vcore by .025 up to 1.375V and ran OCCT for two hours just fine. I'm going to increase the FSB some more and test some more and we'll see where it goes from there!

 

[trents]

Good. You seem to be going at it the right way.
Yes, all ddr3 desktop ram is compatible with both Intel and AMD CPUs. Don't heed the marketing hype.

 

[Neutrolizer]

Okay so i pumped up my FSB up to 250 and needed my vcore up to at least 1.475 v so it wasn't encountering any errors on OCCT. I also bumped up my CPUNB voltage by .1 v from 1.1 to 1.2v before bumping my vcore which helped save my computer from actually crashing when running OCCT.

The question I have is should I go any higher for my Vcore or not, or just wait until I get the mosfet sink. Also my ram is up to 1000, should I be messing with the timings as reported by CPUZ from 6 6 6 18 to 7 7 7 20? I don't need to mess with tRC do I? Thanks!

 

[keny]

You're right about the timings, you will need to drop them to jedec#2 ,as you're rams overclocked at the timings you have, but will be slightly underclocked at jedec#2. copy all the settings (including trc).HT is a little low, but if you bump the multi another you will be at 2000 and that's about as high as the ht likes on athlons, so only set it to 2000 if you're staying put at 3.62ghz (but I bet you want more).If you are still getting stability issues you can try and bump the nb chipset voltage a notch to help with the higher fsb.

 

[trents]

If you're at 1.475 vcore in bios, what's it pulling when under full load. HWMonitor will show that stat. I'm inclined to advise not going any higher until you get your mosfet heat sink. To tell you the truth, at 3.625 ghz you are at or very close to the wall with that CPU family anyway with air cooling. Some will go 3.8 but you don't seem to have a "cherry" as we say.

 

[Neutrolizer]

My CPU is pulling 51.5 C under full load when I ran it for an hour. I misreported a number earlier which was for CPUNB voltage. It isn't 1.2, it is 1.14. So it actually changes at .02 v increments, always confuses me haha.

So I tried to run it earlier to see how the temp on my CPU was under full load but there was something wrong with one of the cores so that's when I changed the ram settings and CPUNB voltage from 1.12 to 1.14. I also increased the HT frequency, it is sitting at exctly 2000 mhz. It was a bit low earlier because I thought it wouldve been over 2000. I dont know, sometimes it runs fine for an hour or two but other times it just encounters an error within 30 mins. So i'm gonna run OCCT overnight and see how that turns out. Does increasing the CPUNB voltage increase stability?

 

[trents]

My CPU is pulling 51.5 C under full load when I ran it for an hour. I misreported a number earlier which was for CPUNB voltage. It isn't 1.2, it is 1.14. So it actually changes at .02 v increments, always confuses me haha.

So I tried to run it earlier to see how the temp on my CPU was under full load but there was something wrong with one of the cores so that's when I changed the ram settings and CPUNB voltage from 1.12 to 1.14. I also increased the HT frequency, it is sitting at exctly 2000 mhz. It was a bit low earlier because I thought it wouldve been over 2000. I dont know, sometimes it runs fine for an hour or two but other times it just encounters an error within 30 mins. So i'm gonna run OCCT overnight and see how that turns out. Does increasing the CPUNB voltage increase stability? Indeed it does. Put the CPUNB to 1.225v and your dram voltage to 1.55..