Unable to get 2600k stable

[Phil.P]

Hey all!

Just bought a brand new rig:

-MSI Z68A-GD65 (G3)
-Intel 1155 i7 2600k (sandy bridge)
-Kingston HyperX Genesis 2x4g DDR3 @ 1866 (waiting on two more for 16g total)
-Noctua NH-C14 air/air cooler
-Corsair 500R (with 2 extra 120mm intake fans on top)

I kept these from my old rig for now:

-Antec 650w power supply
-Radeon HD 5870

I updated EVERY possible driver with Live Update5 from MSI before doing anything.

I searched far and wide for a "stable OC" for this CPU. I decided to OC the turbo function. These are the settings I used in the MSI BIOS:

-Internal PPL Overvoltage *auto -> enabled*
-EIST *left enabled*
-Intel Turbo Boost *left enabled*
-DRAM Frequency *changed to DDR3-1866MHz*

On the tutorial is says to enable the "Extreme Memory Profile(XMP), mine has three options, Disable / Profile 1 / Profile 2. I left it disabled.

-Spread Spectrum *left enabled*
-VDroop Control *auto -> Low VDroop*
-CPU Core Voltage *auto*
-DRAM Voltage *auto -> 1.637v* (Kingston rates it @ 1.64v)

***CPU Features***
-Hyper-threading *left enabled*
-Execute Disable Bit *left enabled*
-Intel Virtualization Tech *left enabled*
-Power Technology *left enabled*
-C1E Support *left disabled*
-Overspeed Protection *enabled -> disabled*
-Long Duration Power Limit *95 -> 200*
-Long Duration maintained *left at 1000*
-Short Duration Power Limit *118 -> 250*
-1 to 4 Core Ratio Limit *0 -> 45*

Saved and rebooted. No problems booting up, all is good up to now!

Opened up CPU-Z, HW Monitor and IntelBurn.

Started at standard for 10 times. OC goes to 4489.7 MHz @ 1.384V. Temps are per core: 62/73/75/69 and package of 77. IntelBurn tells me that the OC is safe.

Here's my problem, IF I go to a higher stress level, two of my cores hits 96.. (88/96/96/92 with 1.392 v) and I get a nice blue screen saying that one of my cores crashed.

At idle, the CPU runs at 1596.4Hz @ 0.968V. Temps are 22/28/27/26.

Here's the batch and info from my processor:
Model: A
Ext. Model: A
Stepping: 7
Revision: D2
Batch: 139C325

After my 2nd blue screen, I checked my thermal paste if I had good coverage. I added a little blob in case, but coverage was pretty good since all of the backing plate was covered already. I used the supplied paste from Noctua btw.

From the "knowledge" I can gather, my cores aren't supposed to hit those temps at that clock speed (x45) and voltage (less than 1.39V) and I'm not supposed to crash either, I see people getting 4.8 with no problems. I'm pretty lost as to what I'm doing wrong OR is the problem with the hardware? Bad processor? Also, I find it weird that I'm getting such a wide range of temps. The cooler? Bad BIOS settings maybe?

Thanks for reading!

 

[checkeredhat09]

First thing that come to mind is the TIM. You should probably check it, and reapply.

Edit: Dur, you already did that. Ignore me

 

[checkeredhat09]

Your setup looks pretty tame, and by that I just mean that as you stated there is no obvious reason that it should be hitting those temps. I would start by disabling the turbo and most of the auto settings, and doing everything manually.

Disable Speedstep, power saving features, spread spectrum etc, or actually just follow this thread. Then retry. If there is some funky auto-OC'ing going on, this may help take some of the guess work out of determining the cause.

 

[Phil.P]

Thx for the help, but nothing worked...

If I turn off the turbo option, I basically have no OC even if the multiplier per core is set to 45 manually. I found an OC review of my board (he has a P67A) with a 2500k, followed it, and he get's 4.7 and I get the stock 3.4 lol...

I really dont get this BIOS or why it dosent want to OC...

 

[redduc900]

Your Vcore of ~1.38-1.39V is way too high for a 4.5GHz clock, as it should be more along the lines of 1.25-1.30. And w/ 8GB of RAM installed running at DDR3-1866, you'll need to bump the IMC voltage (CPU I/O voltage) to ~1.25-1.30V or possibly higher. And after you add another 8GB for a total of 16GB, you'll need to bump the vIMC even higher. Also disable Spread Spectrum and EIST (Intel SpeedStep), and you probably don't need PLL Overvoltage enabled until you hit a higher clock. And manually adjust the four primary DRAM timings, w/ all of the sub-timings left on Auto.