SOLVED Unable to boot when passing 219 MHz base clock

[Tallang]

Hello everyone!

I'm new in this forum, and new in the world of overclocking. I built my own computer a few years ago with these features:

Motherboard: Asus P6X58D-E
CPU: Intel Core i7 950 @ 3,07GHz
RAM: Corsair Dominator CMP8GX3M4A1600C8 x 4
GPU: XFX Radeon HD 6870
OS: Win 7 Professional 64bit

During this summer I wanted to look into overclocking to increase the performance of my computer. I have done a lot of googling to learn and understand the basics of overclocking, where one of the guides i read came from this forum: http://www.overclockers.com/3-step-guide-overclock-core-i3-i5-i7/

I followed this guide step by step. I lowered the CPU and RAM multipliers to the lowest setting, the unclock multiplier to RAM x 2, and adjusted the voltage of the IOH to 1,3 and QPI/VTT to default 1,2V. I was actually able to increase the base clock to 218 MHz without even increasing the QPI/VTT volt a single increment. But when i reach 219 MHz, the computer wont even start! :S

When I boot with a base clock of 219 MHz the screen stays black for about 20 secs. Then the computer gives a beep, but this beep is longer than the usual beep you get when booting. Then the ordinary boot screen appears (American Megatrends) but it is really slow and freezes when reaching "Detecting USB Devices". Then I am forced to reboot manually. When booting for the second time, the boot screen works as normal, but when I am supposed to enter Windows, the computer gives another beep, and a message appears:

"Overclocking failed! Please enter Setup to re-configure your system."

By my knowledge, this can not be caused by too low QPI/VTT Voltage, as this should have caused a bluescreen earlier on. I have used Prime95 and RealTemp for stressing the CPU and monitoring the temperature, and it all works out fine after 5 minutes of stress testing.

Does anyone have any idea why my computer is unable to boot when reaching 219 MHz base clock? Thank you for any help!

(Sorry if my explanation is bad. I may explain it in greater detail if you request me to.)

 

[ATMINSIDE]

Sounds like to me, that you have simply hit the upper limit for your base clock.

 

[Woomack]

Without any special settings these boards won't make more than 221MHz bclk. To set anything higher you can try to set 110-115 MHz pcie ( some hdd don't like 107+ and some other devices act weird above 115 but you can try ). I don't recommend to set anything higher than ~215MHz bclk ( low chance for stability ).
Anything above 215 or even 210bclk depends mainly from cpu. Try to drop cpu multi to x18 or x19 and check if you can make more.
I had 3 cpus on this board and all couldn't make more than 213MHz bclk on x21 cpu multi and more than 216MHz on x20 multi. Using x19 multi i7 920 made 240MHz+ for tests but nothing above 221MHz was stable.
~230MHz with QPI set to normal speed , 240+ while set to slow mode. 222MHz = no boot at all and it's normal.

here is link to old result before board burned and killed cpu http://valid.canardpc.com/show_oc.php?id=1432838

Voltages that may help : QPI/VTT up to 1.45V for 24/7 ( depends from cooling ), IOH up to 1.25V ( if you check that it's not helping then drop it to ~1.18V )

i7 950 that I have now on R3E can't even make 215MHz bclk on low multi

 

[dejo]

agree with Woomack that pci-e frequency may help you to pass 219 if you havent already moved it up.
I had 3 asus p6t deluxe boards and 2 of them would max at 217 and one of them would do 250. when raising pcie freq, a few points should gain you a few points of bclk. My gigabyte board that did 257bclk took 117 pcie to get there

 

[Tallang]

Thank you for brilliant answers from all of you!

I think I should explain why I wanted to reach such high base clock in the first place.

My main goal was to reach a rock solid clock at 4 GHz on the CPU, which I think is possible even though I am a beginner at overclocking. I actually succeeded reaching this goal about a week ago with these settings:

Ai Overclock Tuner Manual
CPU Ration Setting 19
Intel(R) SpeedStep (TM) Tech Disabled
Xtreme Phase Full Power Mode Auto
BCLK Frequency 211
PCIE Frequency 100
DRAM Frequency DDR3-1691MHz
UCLK Frequency 3384MHz
QPI Link Data Rate Auto
ASUS/3rd Party UI Priority ASUS Utility

******* Please key in numbers directly! *******
CPU Voltage Control Manual
CPU Voltage 1.35625
CPU PLL Voltage Auto
QPI/DRAM Core Voltage 1.21875
IOH Voltage 1.18
IOH PCIE Voltage Auto
ICH Voltage Auto
ICH PCIE Voltage Auto
DRAM Bus VOltage Auto
DRAM DATA REF Voltage on CHA Auto
DRAM CTRL REF Voltage on CHA Auto
DRAM DATA REF Voltage on CHB Auto
DRAM CTRL REF Voltage on CHB Auto
DRAM DATA REF Voltage on CHC Auto
DRAM CTRL REF Voltage on CHC Auto
*****************************************************
Load-Line Calibration Disabled
CPU Differential Amplitude Auto
CPU Clock Skew Auto
CPU Spread Spectrum Auto
IOH Clock Skew Auto
PCIE Spread Spectrum Auto

As you can see, the CPU voltage is pretty high (in my opinion) which was necessary to make the clock stable. When I used these settings and ran Prime95 and RealTemp, the CPU cores reached 92 degrees celcius, which in my opinion is far to high.

For this reason I thought I could lower the CPU multiplier and increase the base clock, so that I maybe could make the CPU temperature a little lower. Maybe this was a bad assumption?

With the settings displayed above I was able to run somewhat stable at BCLK 211 and CPU multi x18 with a low CPU voltage. But taking the step from CPU multi x18 to x19 demanded a ridiculous increase in CPU voltage to make it stable, which of course is the reason for the high CPU temperature. Yesterday I read about CPU PLL Voltage, and that it can be used to make the CPU stable at higher clocks. Do you think I can lower the CPU Voltage, and increase the CPU PLL voltage to make the settings mentioned above stable, without the CPU reaching 92 degrees?

EDIT: My CPU cooler is a Corsair A70, which I think is a decent cooler.

 

[Woomack]

No matter what cpu multi you set you will still need the same vcore so in all cases cpu temp will be +/- the same. My i7 950 is making 4GHz on about the same voltage and under full load is hitting 90*C on wc with 3x120mm HS so I can say that's not good but pretty normal for these cpus.
Lower CPU PLL = lower temp
Lower IMC , QPI/VTT voltage = lower temp ( but you already have low )

Just set all voltages manually so board won't set higher voltage in auto settings and try to lower vcore and pll.

 

[Tallang]

Thank you for brilliant help from all of you

 

[redduc900]

Just curious... instead of a BCLK of 211 x 19 = 4.0GHz w/ the DRAM freq. at ~DDR3-1691 (211 x 8), why not just lower the BCLK to 200 x 20 = 4.0GHz w/ the DRAM mult. at the same x8 DDR3-1600?