Q9650 Overclock Help

[silent007]

Hey guys.

First time on here and first time in the whole overclocking scene and I seem to be having problems. I was told to Overclock my q9650 from it's stock 3.0 to 4.2+. Problem i'm getting is that I cannot get it above 3.6 stable for some reson. Like I said I'm new at this and there for most likely doing something wrong. If anyone can help me out aht would be great.

The settings i have in bios right now are:

Cpu Ratio Setting: 9.0
FSB Freq: 400
pcie Freq: 100
fsb Strap: Auto
Dram Freq: 1066mhz
Dram Timing Control: MAnual
Cas# Latency: 5 Dram Clocks
Dram RAS# to CAS# Delay: 5 Dram Clocks
Dram RAS# PreCharge: 5 Dram Clocks
Dram RAS# Activate Precha: 15 Dram Clocks
RAS# to RAS# Delay :AUTO
ROW Refresh Cycle Time : 50 Dram Clocks
DRAM Static Read Control: Disabled
Dram Read training: Disabled
MEM.Oc Charger: Enabled
Ai. Clock Twister: Moderate

Volatges:
Cpu: 1.34375
Cpu Gtl Voltage Ref(0/2): .635
Cpu Gtl Voltage Ref(1/3): .625
Cpu pll Voltage: 1.56
Fsb Termination Voltage: 1.36
Dram Voltage: 1.96
NB Voltage: 1.40
NB Gtl Ref: .635
Sb Voltage: 1.10
Pcie Sata Voltage 1.50



Load line Calib: Enabled
Cpu Spread spectrum: Disabled
Pcie Spread Spectrum disabled
CpuClock Skew: Normal
NB Clock Skew Normal
Cpu Margin Enhancement: optimized

Those are all the setting I have changed not sure if they'r good or not.

Lastly my system specs are:

Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Quad CPU Q9650 @ 3.00GHz (4 CPUs), ~3.6GHz on Corsair H70 Water Cooler
Asus P5Q-Premium
4gb KINGSTON HYPERX KIT 2GB DDR2 1066MHZ
Hd 6970 2gb+ Hd 6950 2gb in Crossfire
Corsair HX750Watt PSU
Samsung f3 500 gb Hard drive
Windows 7 Professional 64-bit (6.1, Build 7601) Service Pack 1

Thank you in advance for any help.

 

[RGone]

MB Voltage: 1.40 = isn't that NB Voltage?
Mb Gtl Ref: .635 = isn't that NB Gtl Ref?

 

[silent007]

Yes it is Nb Sorry about that just edited the post.

 

[notarat]

One thing to keep in mind is:

Not every Q9650 can hit 4.2GHz.

You may simply have one that can only get to 3.6GHz stable. (Still a 600MHz overclock though )

 

[bignick]

I highly doubt that chip will only go to 3.6. My 9650 would do 4.5Ghz with 1.45V and a ton of NB voltage and that chip wasn't a "good" chip. I have no experience with your board but I think it has to do with your settings. Voltages seem low on gtl ref. voltage and your gonna have to bump CPU voltage over 1.4v to get it over 4Ghz. There are a few things your gonne need to change to get it to go. I'm hoping someone with some experience with this board will chime in.

 

[silent007]

thanks for the replies.

I'm pretty sure this processor hits more then 3.6 aswell as i see alot of people with it at 4.0Ghz 4.2ghz 4.3ghz and 4.5ghz. I Wanted to get it as high as possible with the h70 cooler. I was told that I would need it atleast above 4.2 to get rid of most of my cpu bottleneck. 4.5 would be great.

 

[silent007]

Anyone?

 

[jason4207]

Lower your CPU multi, and RAM speed temporarily and see how fast you can run the FSB and remain stable under P95 LargeFFT load. You should be able to get up to 460-475. You may need to adjust NB volts, NB GTL, and/or FSB Term.

Then see what your RAM will do. Keep timings loose (higher is looser), and try every divider you want to. I find the 5:6 divider works best on P45, so for 450FSB you are looking at 1080 on the RAM; this is a modest OC and may be possible w/ a little extra voltage. 475FSB gets you to 1140 on the RAM which it might not be capable of. Again, test w/ P95 Large FFT, but also test w/ memtest. RAM tweaking can take a while, and lead to OS corruption, so make sure you back-up first, and don't get frustrated. Leave it a little slow or loose if you don't have the patience.

Finally go back and up your CPU multi 0.5 at a time, test, and make adjustments as needed to vcore and CPU GTL. This time test w/ P95 SmallFFT.

Knowing what your NB, RAM, and CPU can do separately and what settings are required to reach each of those 3 goals will help you to understand how to bring them all together in unison.

4GHz should be easy. Above that it will take a lot more time to fine-tune.

 

[silent007]

Thanks for the reply will give that a try and see what I get