New MOBO BSOD with OC

[TagTeam]

Ok guys, im not completely new to OC but pretty close. I installed a new mobo because 1) im now crossfiring 2) i wanted better OC. And now im getting BSOD. Current System specs
FX8350 stock
2x hd7950, msi tf3 and saphire duel 960/1300
m5a99fx pro 2.0
gskill 2x 8gb 1866 ram at 1600 i believe its xmp
h100i
Ultra x4 1050watt 80 silver psu

Ok to start things off before i had 970 extreme 3. I had cpu at 4.5 stable and gpus at 1050/1400. The pci x4 was killing my crossfire but i needed to wait a bit for a new mobo. I got the asus board yesterday. I tried following the popular asus board fx series overclocking guide and uses jayz2cents youtube video. I tried oc both fsb and multiplier seperately and both would hit 4.5 without voltage increase (as expected at 4.6 cores 1,2,3,4,7 failed) but after a while of gaming or heaven bench it BSOD. I had to turn everything to basically stock to keep it stable. Also i noticed my video driver would glitch at 4.4 and i would lose color profile taskbar as though i was using the mobo graphics. But everything else would perform as normal. I would like to OC to 4.7 at least as well as possible push my gpus a little, and everything i have read it should be very capable with my setup. I thought my 4.4 OC gpu 1000/1400 was doing well but after about 2 hours of starcraft 2 i decided to run heaven. BSOD. So i reset my bios to stock for my CPU. Played crysis 3 and bf4 for about an hour and everything was fine. I ran 3dmark 11 and BSOD. So i rebooted dropped gpu to 960/1300 and 3dmark ran fine. I ran out of time to mess with it tonight but i find myself scratching my head. Any ideas? I feel like it has to be a voltage issue or something with ram or pci lanes. Maybe I dont have a clue. Any help would be great.

 

[caddi daddi]

#1, stop overclocking everything at one time, cpu first.

it runs everything fine at stock?

 

[TagTeam]

Yes. It seems to run fine with everything at stock.

 

[TagTeam]

My gpus were still overclocked when i installed new mobo because i use afterburner. I now know its probably a good idea to return them to stock for a new setup.

 

[TagTeam]

And i did have a couple system freeze issues along the way but mostly BSOD.

 

[TagTeam]

The system freez issues were accompanied by my mem ok light going red on MOBO when overclocking FSB

 

[caddi daddi]

start from stock, set the ram to the spd tab in cpu-z, use multi and vcore only, after getting that stable, work with the ram and then the cpu/nb.

what are you using for cooling?

 

[caddi daddi]

HOLD IT!!! new motherboard........ did you do a fresh install of windows??????

 

[TagTeam]

Ok. Ill start there tomorrow. I have a H100i and plenty of case cooling.

 

[TagTeam]

No i didnt do fresh install of windows. My windows dvd was stolen a couple months ago.

 

[TagTeam]

Is it possible to get a fresh install without the disc?

 

[TagTeam]

Nevermind. I figured out the windows install. Ill start there

 

[caddi daddi]

good idea.

 

[rayraysfunhouse]

Once you have a fresh install of Windows let us know and we can start to help OC your CPU. Once you have a stable OC on your CPU then move to a memory overclock if that is what you are looking towards then GPU OC.

 

[TagTeam]

Thats the plan. Thanks guys

 

[trents]

TagTeam: Slow down! These things need to be done systematically and in small increments. Checking for temps and stability after making each small overclock settings change. Do you have CPU-z, HWMonitor (non pro version) and Prime95 installed on your computer yet? If not, do that first thing after returning video cards to stock and motherboard/CPU/Memory to stock. And before you do any overclocking you should check baseline temps to make sure your cooling is functioning properly. So run a 20 minute Prime95 blend test with HWMonitor open as well. Then capture the image of HWMonitor immediately after the stress test. Attach the image to a post so we can look at temps. To attach images, use the Go Advanced button and the paperclip tool in the advanced window.

 

[RGone]

Get a working baseline...

...baseline that establishes if all is well before beginning an overclock. Everyone of us that pro-offers help in this forum section always establish a baseline to overclock upwards incrementally from.

This is what we need to see for sure and a real good starting point.

Normally during setup and testing we disable C1/E, C6, Cool N Quiet, APM, TurboCore and in windows performance manager itself we set to "performance" mode. ALSO if you have HPC in bios you would ENABLE it. That way there are not "other" settings messing with the overclocking process. Some of those settings are not available on all models of cpu but where in evidence we disable for setup of overclock process.

CPU Tab in CPUz from CPUID com

Memory Tab in CPUz from CPUID com

SPD Tab in CPUz from CPUID com

And this is screen capture of HWMonitor (free version) from CPUID com
HWMonitor has been scrolled enough and large enough to show Min/Max of Voltages and includes the CPU CORE TEMPS / "package" temps fully visible. Latest versions of HWMonitor show the CPU Core Temp as " a Package Temp" and is only shown as a single temp since there were never multple, individual core temp sensors anyway.

This capture is made of HWMonitor after it has been open and running on the desktop logging Min/Max temps and voltages while Prime 95 was running Blend Mode test on all cores for at least 20 mins and then the capture of HWMonitor was made and it shows the Min/Max temps and voltages before P95 Blend was started and while running P95 Blend mode and gives much greater insight into how the system is performing without guessing.

In order to attach screenshots of INDIVIDUAL images as suggested, first crop and capture the images with Snipping Tool found in Windows Accessories or equivalent. Then click on Go Advanced, a button at the bottom of every new post window. Then click on the little paperclip tool at the top of the Advanced post window when it opens. Clicking on the paperclip tool brings up the file browser/upload tool and the rest is fairly obvious.

 

[Johan45]

I would like to add that although the M5A is a decent board you might have a hard time hitting the 4.7 mark with it. The power section on that board is only 6+2 and will heat up on you so you'll also need some extra fans behind the mobo and on the VRM.

 

[TagTeam]

Yeah. Im aware of the VRM heat issues with the M5A. I have some extra fans. I'm going to get creative and see what we can do for thermal control there. Also I do have all the necessary software for monitoring and stress testing. I have overclocked a few times before but I haven't bumped voltage much. And tis is my first time changing a component and ReOverclocking. I was following your basic OC steps, baseline, max oc without voltage and so on. I didn't realize fresh windows install would be important, well I had forgotten it could be important anyway. I also didn't think dropping GPUs back to stock would be necessary. I have been suggested that removing them all together while overclocking is a good idea. Also I have been suggested my PSU might be an issue. All my stress testing with prime 95 wasn't ever an issue. Worked great up to 4.5 without voltage bump, both stable and thermals were good, which I have read is expected with my CPU. It was when I stressed my GPU's I started having BSOD issues. Which I only noticed because after a prime test I ran Heaven 4.0 for kicks and BSOD after about 30-45 seconds. So I backed everything to stock to start new and contacted the Minds. When I get off work Im going to work on fresh windows install and remove 1 GPU. Im completely ok with not hitting 4.7, I would like to get the most out of it I can. I have read that OC can have better single thread performance but Im not sure how true this is, and that a combo of FSB and Multi gives the best OC, also not sure how true that is. Anyone have any input there? Once I have everything back to stock and clean install, Ill run a baseline and post results.

 

[trents]

Can you pass the Prime95 blend test for 2 hr.? If you can, it's probably going to be stable and if not probably not.

The reason we asked you to put your GPU back to stock clocks is because of the very thing you are experiencing. When you have both CPU and GPU overclocked and are getting blue screens you don't know which one is causing it. So you overclock each component one at a time and make sure it is stable before overclocking the other one. Elimination of as many variables as possible in the overclocking process is a time-honored method.

But if you're blue screens are being caused by the GPU, is it because of the overclock or a driver bug? If you put it back to stock and still are getting blue screens you can begin looking at the driver being the problem instead of the OC.