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HOWTO: Overclock C2Q (Quads) and C2D (Duals) - A Guide v1.1

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Thanks grey. Will try another lapping and the orientation. Actually I did not loose 10C it was my mistake, there is a 10C difference but when my case is open, when closed it is nearly the same it was before lapping. I measured open case vs closed case and that is way wrong.

My HS is Thermalright IFX-14, it should beat yours for 3-4C, it is really one of the best air coolers available plus I use two 120x38 SilenX fans mounted on it. I also have a HD3870 x2 GPU very close to the HS and it is generating way too much heat in my rather small Antec P180 case. That could be important factor.

Is there any perfectly flat surface except the razor I can use to check the flatness of HS?
 
@Sineast - I think most of your problem are your two 3870's honestly... do they vent out the back or into the case? I dunno what to do in a dual card situation really short of using one of those insane fan boxes like the 900. Also, Realtemp reads lower because I believe it's using a different tjmax. Which is right? No one knows for sure :)

Did you check the flatness via the magic marker test?
 
Okay, so it ran for an hour without an error or crashing. Now go back to the BIOS and start to minimize your vcore for the CPU, and stress test it again. Eventually, your goal should be 6+ hours of stress testing. Other people will tell you to do it for 12 or more hours.

I think this whole process can be easier if you start with a lower vcore and work your way up. I started my testing @ 1.2150v and found that I got a rounding error after just 3 minutes. I pumped it up to 1.2375v and got the same result after about 21 minutes (actually depicted in the screenshot above). Further increasing it to 1.2500v gave an error after the first hour. Finally, 1.2625v ran stable for over an overnight (>8 hours) at which point I stopped and called it good.

Nice guide. Only one thing bothers me about it. These two paragraphs are contradictory. The first reads like in order to increase stress test length you should minimize the Vcore. The second paragraph reads, as it should, to increase the run time without error you have increased the Vcore.
 
@dsb1829 - thanks for the feedback. I may refine that transition in the next version of the guide to be less confusion.
 
Nice Job ! Thumbs up for this one. Alot of things were clearly explain into relation to the ratios and voltages. Thanks for helping me for my first overclock.
 
Guide is now version 1.6

• Added a detailed section to help you find the minimum stable CPU and MB vcore settings. Check it out (near the bottom of the guide entitled, “Stress Testing and Minimizing Your Vcores”)!
• Updated the CPU table
• Provided a less than $3 method you can use to shave off some NB load temps (in the thermal management section at the end of the guide).
 
Hi guys, noobus maxuimus here. What does it mean when Prime fails on one core and what soes it mean if it restarts the PC?Im trying to get a stable overclock but Im totally clueless.
 
Top Post Graysky, love the 1.6 update :)

Hello all, new to the site and new to overclocking (i make noobs look like Grand Masters of Overclocking), after reading the new 1.6 updated post i am more than intrested in giving this a go with my setup.

At the moment i my setup is :-

Q9300 2.5GHZ at stock speeds, stock core settings, :bang head

Abit IP35 Dark Raider, have a Abit IP35 Pro board coming tomorrow i hope,

Crucial Ballistix Tracer Cas 5 1066mhz memory 2 x 1GB sticks (set gone back to Crucial as faulty thanks to this site and Memtest 86 :mad: ) at 800mhz on this board at stock volts,

Artic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro heatsink fan using Artic Silver 5 paste, (thinking of lapping my HS after i now know what it means and does, :screwy: )

Coolermaster Praetorian 732 Ally Case with 2 x 80mm rear exhaust and 1 x 120mm front intake,

Enermax Liberty ELT620AWT version 1 PSU

Seagate 250gb sata 2 16mb cache windows drive and 1 x samsung 500gb sata 2 16mb cache storgae drive and 2 x western digital 250gb sata 2 16mb cache storage drives, 1 is external in a icy box 360 housing,

8800GTS Gainward 512mb card at stock speeds with stock cooler, drivers 169.25

Windows Vista Ultimate 32bit with SP1 and all possible updates.

Ok i also have a P5K-E WIFI AP edition motherboard and 2 x 2GB sticks of Corsair Cas 5 800mhz memory and a 8800GTS 640MB card bios flashed with XXX bios at my disposal, why well i have been trying to overclock this damn Q9300 without much success :bang head and how i so wish i hadn't traded out my Q6600 chip :screwy:, god they are a overclockers dream at x9 multiplier it seems from what i have read , my Q9300 is only 7.5 x multiplier and seems a bad chip to have to overclock as no one seems to be buying them and sticking with there Q6600's at 3GHZ+ speeds.

Ok so now to my questions and queries, first, heatsink and fan, would you upgrade to a Thermaltake Ultra 120 extreme like most people hear are running or would you buy a better fan like a Scythe 120mm kits and use the same heatsink. What speeds do you run your fan at when overclocking, do you run it full speed disabling the auto fan speed setting in the bios?

Artic Silver 5 paste, whats the best way to apply it, on the chip or heat sink and how do you spread it or do you just put a small amount like shown by Graysky and put the heatsink ontop and let it spread itself?

Best mobo to keep out of what i have, Asus P5K-E Wifi Ap, IP35 Dark Raider or IP35 Pro motherboard for overclocking?

Q9300 chip or sell and go buy another Q6600 chip for overclocking?

Lap my heatsink or not to Lap as when i run core temp core 1 is 50, core 2 52-53, core 3 50, core 4 52-53, when i run speedfan i get core 1 45, core 2 47-48, core 3 45, core 4 47-48. which is right what do i go by?

When i overclocked my Q9300 on my Asus board at 2.7GHZ (7.5 x 360 FSB) on stock core voltages before it failed in Prime95 after 6 hours the temps were into the very low 70's altho it was a cool day that day (from the UK, summer may have just started here), i ran Prime95 on standard clock speeds for 6 hours to test chip is fine today (running it tonight for a further 12+ hours to make sure all is good before i try overclocking with the IP35 Pro board tomorrow) which has been around 70-72 degrees outside temp and my chip was up in the low 70's on all cores (not overclocked), maybe i got a crap Q9300 and should maybe just sell it.
I ran my chip at 7.5 x 400mhz @ 3.0ghz with vcore volts of around 1.2650 (got it wrote down here somewhere) with NBcore/SBcore/ICHcore etc set to auto and it ran in Prime95 for 8 hours with no problems so i stopped it, ran 3dmark06 (100mhz setting in bios for VGA) and wow, really bad FPS which i now think must have been the other core settings set to auto from reading this new 1.6 update.

Anyway, i think thats enough for my first post, hope someone reads it a can give me some advice on what i should or shouldn't keep/buy to enhance my setup to make the overclocking mission i have undertaken easier, hehe.
 
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Ok so now to my questions and queries, first, heatsink and fan, would you upgrade to a Thermaltake Ultra 120 extreme like most people hear are running or would you buy a better fan like a Scythe 120mm kits and use the same heatsink. What speeds do you run your fan at when overclocking, do you run it full speed disabling the auto fan speed setting in the bios?

Yeah, the TRUE-120 si the way to go. I have a an SFLEX (1600 RPM) that's nearly silent. It runs full speed 24/7.

Artic Silver 5 paste, whats the best way to apply it, on the chip or heat sink and how do you spread it or do you just put a small amount like shown by Graysky and put the heatsink ontop and let it spread itself?

Do it like I recommends (line method). See their website (linked in my guide).

Best mobo to keep out of what i have, Asus P5K-E Wifi Ap, IP35 Dark Raider or IP35 Pro motherboard for overclocking?

Q9300 chip or sell and go buy another Q6600 chip for overclocking?

Hmm.. dunno, out of those three... I'm in love with my new DFI LT P35-T2R. How fast do you want to go..?? You can hit 3.38 @ 7.5x450 with the Q9300.

Lap my heatsink or not to Lap as when i run core temp core 1 is 50, core 2 52-53, core 3 50, core 4 52-53, when i run speedfan i get core 1 45, core 2 47-48, core 3 45, core 4 47-48. which is right what do i go by?

Well, if you're keeping the Q9300 you should lap it also.. you get the biggest bang-for-the-buck when both pieces are lapped. Your temps aren't too bad honestly. I wouldn't lap it. Re-read the guide, see in the temp monitoring section for the answer to that question.
 
Version 1.6.1 is up. Totally re-wrote the section on memory which now includes a discussion on both DDR2/DDR3 and formulas you can use to calculate max supported FSB of a given module based on it's DDRX-Y and PCX-Y designations. Also re-ordered the first part of the guide.
 
My appologies graysky, I must have been on crack when I asked that question. Clearly I did not understand at the time but it now makes a lot more sense (after going through it again). And using the stratagies mention in your post, I now have my first stable overclock. Thanks once again.
 
Thanks for your comments Graysky.

A few more questions sadly, i am going to upgrade my heatsink and fan to the Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme, but i can't find anywhere in the UK with any in stock, but i can get hold of the Thermalright Ultra 120 no problems, would you get the Ultra 120 now or hold out about a month for the Extreme version to come back into stock, also will be getting the same Scythe Sflex 120mm 1600rpm fan as you stated you use.

Dunno about the UK, but how do US-based companies handle international shipments? I've always purchased my TRUE's (all 3 of them) from www.heatsinkfactory.com -- dunno if they can ship to the UK... I don't see what they can't. There you can get both the HS and the SFLEX. It was a little under $70 (USD) a few weeks ago (both the HS and fan and shipping).

If I were you, I'd wait to find the extreme version as the extra heatpipes do make a difference.

OK, above you asked what speed am i looking for out of my chip and stated that i could probably get 450 x 7.5 making 3.3GHZ, so with my new IP35 pro board (bios 1.6), i undertook the task of 450 x 7.5 and left all settings at auto or what it was set at under default settings and just changed my Vcore setting for my chip, started at 1.2250V and got all the way upto 1.3150V before i gave up because i could not boot into windows and couldn't remember what the max vcore setting was for my CPU, so i thought lets try this from what i tried before at 400 x 7.5 at 1.2650V which i tried on my Asus P5K-E Wifi AP board which ran stable for 6 hours before system rebooted :bang head, and i am in windows and running Prime95 as i type this for about 2 hours or so, no errors of yet, fingers crossed.

Well, you might be in for an ordeal of optimizing GTL's @ 450 MHz... I don't see why you shouldn't be able to hit that... if you look in my x264 benchmark HD, there are several Q9300's. The quickest is 7.5x425, another @ 420, and another @ 387. You might wanna google around to see if others w/ your board are running that chip @ 450.

Now, thats all i have done, changed FSB to 400 and vcore 1.2650v, nothing else, so if these settings ran Prime95 for 24 hours no errors, then would that be totally lucky? or would you start to lower the vcore to see if you was bleeding volts and heat away?

Wait a minute... you didn't touch your NB or VTT? Re-read the minimizing vcore/stability section of my guide...

My readings are this - 400 x 7.5 = 3.0GHZ with vcore of 1.2650v, showing CPU-Z and Guru vcore at 1.23v running Prime95.
CPU temp in Guru is 53 degrees fan running at around 2200rpm on my Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro, (had to adjust my setting for CPU level from 50-60 degrees as my fan was running at full speed and CPU temp in Guru of around 49-50, was too noisey).
Coretemp version 0.97.1 is showing with prime95 running
core 0 - 70 degrees,
core 1 - 71 degrees,
core 2 - 69 degrees,
core 3 - 71 degrees as i type this at 11:28 PM UK time, are these temps acceptable?

CPU VTT is showing 1.12v in Guru,
MCH is showing 1.27v in Guru,
ICHIO is showing 1.55v in Guru,
ICH is showing 1.07v in Guru

I dunno, but I'll venture a guess that your VTT and MCH are limiting you as both are pretty low. I'm running a VTT of 1.31 and a MCH (NB) of 1.37V for 8.5x400 if that tells you anything.

Which processor do you have again? In my opinion, 70 is kinda warm. Lapping might bring that down as would a better HS as you already know.

DDR2 1066mhz volts setting is set at auto but shows 1.94v in Abit Guru running at 800mhz 1.1 setup, my ballistix tracer shows 4 settings when i consult CPU-Z
333mhz jedec at 1.8v
400mhz jedec at 1.8v
400mhz EPP at 2.2v
533mhz EPP at 2.2v, which do i pick and do i input say 1.8v from the start of my overclcoking tests or leave it set to auto till i get a stable CPU vcore then mess with the DDR2 volts and maybe the cas timings?
which would be best setting -
400mhz jedec at 1.8v cas 5,5,5,18 or
400mhz EPP at 2.2v cas 4,4,4,12? cos i am confused.
If i did try go for 450 x 7.5 3.3GHZ speed my 1066 memory should work at 900mhz at auto volts settings?

I'd recommend that you set your DRAM vcore to whatever crucial recommends. Ignore that bull**** in CPUZ.

Another thing, i have had some wierd beeps, just a short low beep now and then but i had CPU-Z and Abit Guru running at the same time and i have read that they conflict with each other (not 100% sure about the conflict statement), could those beeps have been a conflict as Prime 95 is showing no errors that i can see and i have just passed on all cores at 24k, now on 28k, i have Round Off Checking ticked like you stated in your post so it will show errors and i am using Prime 95 2.5.6 Build 6 version, anyone know what the beeps maybe or if the CPU-Z along side Abit Guru has conflicts? Not running CPU-Z anymore and had no beeps since so far, very strange.

Dunno about those beeps you're describing... is this on a POST or while running? Oh, during a p95 run. I never heard of that period... I also never used Abit Guru... I would recommend that you do not software o/c if that's what guru does... if it's just a monitor, then it's still a wildcard to me.

On a side note, before i ran Prime 95 i ran 3dmark06 (well what better way to crash your system if unstable) and i scored 13053 which is my new top score, lol and it ran with no problems, hehehe, probably a silly thing to run 3dmark06, but i couldn't resist.

One last thing, do you leave Prime95 running for 24 hours alone, or can i do the odd thing like search the web like re-reading your post again and again till the penny drops and i don't need to ask stupid questions like i have above?

Anyway, thanks for listening and the advice.

Durbybard.....

I leave p95 run while I browse the web. Just don't play games or stress out all the cores or else it's not a good workout as p95 will take a back-seat to the other stuff priority-wise.
 
Hey Graysky......

Quick question here......Im using OCZ 2x2GB 800Mhz RAM rated for 4-4-4-15 but im currently running prime (so far 12 hours) on a voltage below the maximum stated by the vendor at 1080Mhz and 5-5-5-15. Should i be expecting to replace these soon ? Am I pushing these hard ?
 
Quick question here......Im using OCZ 2x2GB 800Mhz RAM rated for 4-4-4-15 but im currently running prime (so far 12 hours) on a voltage below the maximum stated by the vendor at 1080Mhz and 5-5-5-15. Should i be expecting to replace these soon ? Am I pushing these hard ?

OCZ rates your reaper memory at Cas 4,4,4,15 @ 2.1v @ 800mhz which you probably know so why are you clocking them @ 1080mhz @2.15v 5,5,5,15 (which if i am not mistaken is 1066mhz speeds as standard) when you can run them @ 800mhz @ 2.1v Cas 4,4,4,15.

I have Ballistix Tracer 1066mhz memory 2 x 1gb stick, running mine @ 800 mhz @ 2.2v Cas 4,4,4,12 at the moment on my Prime 95 test with no problem, try go up the the next lvl of mhz on my memory which i think is 900 or 1000mhz in my bios at 2.2v at 5,5,5,18 and my system doesn't like it, so i dropped down to 800mhz for system stablity and faster Cas timings, which has improved my 3dmark06 score from 13053 to 13423 just adjusting the Cas to 4,4,4,12 instead of 5,5,5,18 that my motherboard auto sets, 9 hours so far an no errors, glitches, nothing.

So my advice even tho i am still new to overclocking is down your 1080mhz memory to around the 800mhz mark and try input the 2.1v voltage and set your 4 Cas timings to 4,4,4,15 as stated, as for me i feel 800mhz running at 1080mhz is pushing it, hence why i went for 1066mhz memory, cos it will always downgrade to 800/667 if needed.

Just my 2 cents worth, if you understand.

Durbybard
 
Completely dude ! I figured as much, just need to find out which configuration is going to give me that 3.2Ghz, 400 x 8 and have a 1:1 relationship with the mem cause that will give me 3.2GHz? And I'll be able to use my 4-4-4-15 timinings right ?
 
Completely dude ! I figured as much, just need to find out which configuration is going to give me that 3.2Ghz, 400 x 8 and have a 1:1 relationship with the mem cause that will give me 3.2GHz? And I'll be able to use my 4-4-4-15 timinings right ?

Yep, 400 x 8 = 3200 mhz giving you memory of 800mhz @ 1.1 ratio and should run stable at 2.1v cas 4,4,4,15.

If you are thinking of pushing passed 3.2ghz then maybe look at 1066mhz memory cas 5,5,5,15 giving you more ceiling room to tweek you fsb, so if i am correct you are running @ around 432mhz fsb, now 1066mhz memory running at 1080mhz seems a much safer choice both for overclocking/heat and stabiliy than 800mhz running at 1080mhz, only thing that worries me is that at 800 and 1066mhz memory you can input the safe volts and cas timings, but if you are running over 800 mhz to say 850mhz or 1066mhz to say 1100mhz, thats where you would have to mess around finding the right aggresive cas timing and volts for your memory as well as your CPU and NB/SB etc, is why i have gone in at 400 x 7.5 for my CPU, cos i can run my memory at specified volts and cas timings without messing around working out why my system maybe unstable.

As stated above i am running Q9300 @ 3.0 ghz @ 400 x 7.5, memory @ 800mhz @ 2.2v Cas 4,4,4,12 and seems to be holding in Prime 95 so far (fingers crossed)

On a side note i ran both 800mhz memory and 1066mhz memory on my Asus P5K-E motherboard, and if i am correct i only gained around 100 points score in 3dmark06 using 1066 over 800mhz memory, but if you read above, i ran 3dmark06 @ 800mhz cas 5,5,5,18 and scored 13053 and memory @ 800 mhz cas 4,4,4,12 and scored 13423 which to me is a big increase just for a memory tweak.

On another side note, this is how sad i am with me wanting to acheive a successful overclocking mission, i have bought 2 x 2 1gb (making 4 sticks) of Ballistix Tracer Memory(2 faulty and gone back to Crucial for replacements), a Asus P5K-E Wifi AP motherboard, a IP35 pro motherboard and a Gainward 8800GTS 512mb card along with my old setup which was a IP35 Dark Raider motherboard, a 8800GTS 640mb card bios flashed to XXX speeds and Corsair XMS2 800mhz 2 x 2gb sticks of memory, and just purchased some Geil Dragon 800mhz 2 x 1gb stick of memory Cas 4,4,4,12 which if they run at there specified volts and timings will swap out my 1066mhz ballistix as i don't think i want to mess pushing this chip over 3.0Ghz and seems a waste of mhz and money keep them and then sell the rest and upgrade my heatsink to a Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme and fan to a Scythe SFLEX 120mm 1600rpm (maybe 2 of them) and the other 3 fans in my PC so i can close the case on PC and close this attempt once and for all, hehe

Hope this help, stick with your test to see if you can complete 24 hours at your settings and if you are happy and your memory seems happy at 1080mhz and it's not too hot, then stay with it, 800mhz @ 1080mhz would be a nice acheivement in my book,hehe

Durbybard
 
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