Which tweaks in BIOS are necessary with a 4.9 OC (4790K and Maximus VII Hero)?

[Antisthenes]

Earlier I had a 4.7 OC by only changing XMP, the multiplier and the vCore, as described here:

http://www.overclockers.com/forums/showthread.php/753446-How-to-OC-4790K-amp-Maximus-VII-Hero-to-4-6

But just discovered that I can run games with a 4.9, 1.35/36 vCore, temps at 63 c when playing Elder Scroll Online, max settings. 84 c highest one time with only five min of Intel XTU. I know this torture test is very short, but it makes me hope that I actually won the silicon lottery. However, I got the blue screen after hours of gaming, so need to stabilize it. Read somewhere that the vrin must be changed too when vCore is higher than 1.3, and perhaps other tweaks are necessary too, so my very noob question is:

Can someone please tell me the relevant numbers I have to change in the BIOS of my Maximus VII Hero to get a stable 4.9?

I'm still a noob overclocker, so please make it easy. Appreciate your help as always.

Finally, I plan to buy a new chip in 2-3 years, (and I got the Intel OC warranty in any case), so will the Haswell degrade too fast when having a vCore of 1.35 or 1.36?

 

[Lvcoyote]

Can you list all your system specs? Air or water cooling? Better yet, make a signature with all that information.

 

[EarthDog]

1.35v is fine. I wouldn't go above 1.4v or so. Keep temps under 90c on load.

You do not have to touch vring unless you vcore is within .5v. Stock is 1.9v. You can try raising it .1 though if adjusting vcore doesn't do it.

 

[Antisthenes]

Thanks for reply!

Your wrote " ... unless you vcore is within .5v". What does "within .5v" mean?

Is 1.36 or 1.37 vCore also fine? Need to know because 4.9 OC crashes with 1.35/1.36. The temps are good, but something causes instability. Need to find a fix for that.

On the Internet it seems to be two camps regarding Haswell and vCore. Those who say that one should stay below 1.3, because Haswell is a 22 nm, and those who say one should not go higher than 1.35. Do overclockers still disagree about this? Is it now a more or less consensus that 1.35 or 1.36 is okay if one intents to only have the chip for 2-3 years?

The Maximus mobo has initial and eventual vrin. Which numbers should I use here when having the chip at a 4.9 OC? I tried at Auto for initial and 1.95 for eventual, but that crashed with the Intel XTU. At vrin default it took the short XTU stress test without problems, but crashed hours later when playing ESO, (a game which has been reported to cause blue screens, at least that's what some people say).

Again, thanks a lot for help, appreciate it

 

[bartx]

You may also try with voltage regulator settings like voltage frequency or load line calibration.

 

[trents]

You can also try lowering the cache ratio and it's voltage to lower temps. It won't have any real effect on peformance. I've got my 4790k at 4.9 ghz on 1.25 vcore. I've got the cache set to 40x and 1.024 volts. I found that doing this with the cache made it run a couple/three degrees cooler. And yes, I did win the silicon lottery with this chip.

 

[Antisthenes]

Thanks for replies!

EarthDog wrote " ... unless you vcore is within .5v". What does "within .5v" mean?

Is 1.37 vCore also fine? Need to know because 4.9 OC crashes with 1.35/1.36. The temps are good, but something causes instability. Have now tried at 1.37, and the system is stable.

On the Internet it seems to be two camps regarding Haswell and vCore. Those who say that one should stay below 1.3, because Haswell is a 22 nm, and those who say one should not go higher than 1.35. Do overclockers still disagree about this? Is it now a more or less consensus that 1.35-37 is okay (if one intents to only have the chip for 2-3 years)?

The Maximus mobo has initial and eventual vrin. Which numbers should I use here when having the chip at a 4.9 OC?

When I first had a vCore of 1.36, I tried at Auto for initial and 1.95 for eventual, but that crashed with the Intel XTU. At vrin default it took the short XTU stress test without problems, but crashed hours later when playing ESO, (a game which has been reported to cause blue screens, at least that's what some people say).

Have kept vrin at default when having the OC at 1.37, but will that degrade the chip in the long run, leaving the vrin at default at this high voltage?

Again, thanks a lot for help, appreciate it

 

[Woomack]

Voltage in this case has nothing to do with chip process. New CPUs are more durable than the older series. Look at Skylake, these chips have often stock 1.35V and are 14nm. However it's not recommended to run CPU at 1.4V+ for longer. Even 1.35V is not fully tested and may cause faster degradation ( hard to say how much faster ). Really even Intel has no idea about it.
If you feel good with higher voltage then you can use it but I wouldn't run it at more than 1.3V 24/7 simply because I see no difference in ~4.2, 4.5 and 5.0GHz in games or other programs ... but that's me. For benching I'm using up to 1.9V ( mainly ss/dry ice ) even though I know that some chips may die instantly above 1.75V ... but that's me

You don't have to change VRIN on these boards. When you set it to Auto then board will adjust it to ( if BIOS is good ) optimal value. The same with many other settings. If you aren't sure what is correct then simply leave it at auto. I wouldn't set it too high manually. ~2V would be max for long work. Maybe some more but I already saw some chips dying at ~2.2V after longer benching. On better cooling it will go higher but still nothing is guaranteed.

Regarding clock itself, usually above 4.8GHz you will see higher voltage steps like every +1 CPU ratio , up to ~4.8GHz will require ~0.05V but above that it may require ~0.1V. Depends from CPU it happens at lower or higher clock. The worst chips have it at about 4.3GHz.

 

[Antisthenes]

I notice less micro-stuttering in games at 4.7-4.9.

I only have games installed, and XTU shows that only 25-60 percent, give or take, of the cpu is used when playing ESO for example. The max temp at idle is about 48, and goes up to 65 when loading games. Stays around 57-63 during average gameplay.

If I want to, is it relatively safe for the cpu to play a whole day, like ten hours, with breaks of course, at vCore 1.37?

 

[Woomack]

I don't think anyone will guarantee safety after OC but 1.37V is not so high and I bet you will faster replace your PC than anything will happen to this CPU.

 

[Antisthenes]

I always upgrade cpu and gpu every 2-3 years to play the latest games at max, so I stick to 1.37 then. Thanks for advice!

 

[Woomack]

I'm playing all games at ~4-4,2GHz. Recently I downgraded my gaming PC from [email protected] to 3770K@4GHz and I see no difference in games. Both CPUs could run @4.7GHz ~1.32V but I simply saw no difference. My brother is playing everything on [email protected] ... his CPU can make 4.8GHz 1.35V but he simply sees no difference so he's not overclocking it higher.
If you have any micro-stuttering then it's probably caused by storage or graphics card ( maybe drivers ). CPUs for couple of years are not so important in games. What counts is to have 4 cores and 4GHz+ clock. Most work is making graphics card anyway.

 

[Antisthenes]

I got 690 sli and a very good Samsung 256 ssd, and can clearly see difference between 4.0, 4.4 and 4.7 regarding microstuttering, but 690 sli is known for causing it.

 

[EarthDog]

Odd, as people that tested the issue found that clockspeeds mattered very little iirc.

 

[Antisthenes]

Odd perhaps, but would definetly not have overclocked if it didn't improve my games.

But what other things in my pc can cause OC to result in less microstuttering? Virus, malware, hacked or some faulty components?

 

[iLoki]

That depends on a number of things...
By 690 SLi you mean two 690s, correct? If so, this is quad SLi and is very likely going to have some micro stutter no matter what you do. However, some games are more prone to microstutter in SLi vs others. As EarthDog said, people have done some testing and found that clockspeed mattered very little in regards to microstutter.

I've always considered microstutter a fact of life when running SLi, and even more so when running quad SLi.

• What games are you playing?
• What settings are you playing them at?
• You mentioned Skyrim, are you playing with mods?
  - Some of those mods are incredibly system intensive and make even brand new 980Ti's and such work pretty hard to keep good fps going, especially with GeDoSaTo and similar DirectX injection mods.
• How much memory, and what motherboard are you running?
  - The reason I ask this: When you overclocked your cpu, you also overclocked your memory, and it may be your memory being faster that actually made the difference, and not the cpu.

In any case, the voltages you're running at (1.35, 1.37v) won't kill the cpu by any stretch. They may shorten it's life slightly, but the heat is more harmful than the voltage alone. If you can keep it cool at those voltages, then you should be ok.

 

[Antisthenes]

Quad sli and 8 gb ram.

Maximus VII Hero

Now I'm only playing ESO. But noticed differences earlier with BF4.