Newbie here, 955BE running at too high voltages?

[Starshine]

Hello there Overclockers!

I would like to get a little bit of expert opinion regarding undervolting a Phenom II x4 955BE and I found this forum in my google search for answers!

First I guess I should say while I consider myself fairly knowledgeable with PCs with both soft- and hardware I actually never touched the overclock menu of a BIOS let alone played around with software tools, so I'm entirely on newbie ground here which is why I want advice and this forum made a nice first impression to me^^

Recently I upgraded to my aforementioned Phenom II x4 955BE (Stepping 3 Revision RB-C3) on a GIGABYTE 870A-UD3 board and actually I'm really happy with it, on the stock settings it runs on about 36-38°C idle and while I haven't tested it on load yet regarding temps I actually don't have much of a problem.

Just, for my taste the stock HSF is a bit loud under load, not enough to warrant a aftermarket one, though I found out there's actually room for improvement, at least I think so. I read up that by default the 955 should run on a voltage of 1.325v but many people seem to manage something around 1.2xv which I heard would drop the heat a bit.

The thing is I noticed my 955 actually seems to run with 1.392v according to CPU-Z when in performance mode so I wondered if undervolting would help me anything on the noise level during load.

If so I would greatly appreciate any help of getting down to 1.2x volt levels or atleast the stock ones of 1.325v. I searched around and found Phenom MSR Tweaker which seems to do what I want from inside Windows but I figured I would ask before I turn my PC in a pile of rubble as a newbie

Thanks for anything in advance!

 

[RGone]

Go into bios and set vCcore (cpu voltage) downward manually. That is the only way to produce a lower cpu voltage easily. Get off of auto setting and try a lower cpu voltage manually. You will know you went too low when it fails in the boot process. Then you will have to clear the CmOs to get back to default settings and the original higher voltage to cpu so it will boot again. Record the last good voltage before failure to boot and after CmOs clearing you can again go to the last good lowered cpu voltage and then over time using the system you can see if you have random problems which may require upping the vCore by some amount. About it really.

 

[Cigarsmoker]

I've enable CoolnQuiet and C1E on my 955 BE system. I've also OC it to 3.6 GHz. System is stable on Prime 95 for 24 hours. When idling the voltage drops to 1.068 V at 800 MHz, when needed it trottles up to 1.42 V at 3.6 GHz. Processor core idle temp is 1-2 deg C lower than mainboard temp which fluctuates between 25 to 40 degree. Max temp in turn fluctuates between 50 to 62. Room them is the biggest factor.

 

[Madengineer]

If you OC your 955 you wont be able to have anything stable under Stock volts. Stock volts got me to 3.6ghz, 1.4volts go me to 3.8 with a max temp of 58Degrees

 

[Cigarsmoker]

If you OC your 955 you wont be able to have anything stable under Stock volts. Stock volts got me to 3.6ghz, 1.4volts go me to 3.8 with a max temp of 58Degrees

Not true. C1E (CoolnQuiet) will automatically undervolt to 1.068 V as stated above, then crank it'll up again to the OC setting when needed. This only works to multiplier 18.0. On my MB, any multiplier higher than that and C1E won't work. I've noticed this on a few MB while OCing the 955 BE. I love this feature. Low voltage and cool when idle but a mild OC when loaded.

edit - This is the setting on my current rig right now. It's 100% stable except for the occasional BSOD cased by the Sandforce 2281 controller in my Corsair Force 3 120 GB SSD. Simply swapping out the SSD for an HDD (with Win 7 and programs preloaded), I've had this system running under various conditions for 2 straight weeks without any hiccups. Can't resist the speed of the SSD so I'm willing to tolerate an occasional BSOD.

 

[Madengineer]

Not true. C1E (CoolnQuiet) will automatically undervolt to 1.068 V as stated above, then crank it'll up again to the OC setting when needed. This only works to multiplier 18.0. On my MB, any multiplier higher than that and C1E won't work. I've noticed this on a few MB while OCing the 955 BE. I love this feature. Low voltage and cool when idle but a mild OC when loaded.

edit - This is the setting on my current rig right now. It's 100% stable except for the occasional BSOD cased by the Sandforce 2281 controller in my Corsair Force 3 120 GB SSD. Simply swapping out the SSD for an HDD (with Win 7 and programs preloaded), I've had this system running under various conditions for 2 straight weeks without any hiccups. Can't resist the speed of the SSD so I'm willing to tolerate an occasional BSOD.

Obviously it wont be under any kind of strain if Coolnquiet kicks in and undervolts. I was refering to having it undervolted and OC'ed. when you have coolnquiet on, its only OC'ed when your doing stuff on it.

 

[Starshine]

Thanks for the replies everyone, especially RGone, it really is a lot more straightforward than I thought it would be. I set the voltage control to manual and dropped the vCore by 0.150v, so far everything seems to be running fine and I noticed the fan doesn't spin up as loud as it did before

I just wonder if the other voltages are okay now as they all jumped from AUTO to values I don't know anything about so I took a pic just to be safe:

Are any of the other values of safety concerns?

Cigarsmoker and Madengineer: I've got Cool&Quiet enabled too and it drops my vCore to 1.024v at 800mhz it's really a nice feature, I hardly hear my PC at all when it's idle and thanks for the warning about OC'ing and the voltages, I had a feeling that dropping the vCore will make it harder to overclock though for now I don't plan to do so, 3.2ghz does all what I need. (BF3 might change that though )

 

[RGone]

I can see where there would be n0 need to lower any of the other voltages since they are for parts of the chipset and memory. Lowering any of those would not allow the cpu fan to come on any less that I can see and those other voltages don't really influence the cpu and thus the cooling fan on the cpu. Not really.

 

[Starshine]

Thanks again RGone! My system runs perfectly so far playing Crysis and tonight I will probably leave Prime on. I even hit as low as 34°C idle now

I really appreciated the friendly and straightforward help here and who knows, maybe I will try to overclock with the times