Hardware Overclocking Intel's Core 2 Quad Q6600

well, just finished a couple stability tests, not sure if i did them long enough though, only for an hour each.

at 360mhz, 1.4 vcore, 1.3 cpu voltage
the average temp was 55 with a max of 63

then i lowered the vcore to 1.3875, and a 1.25 cpu voltage
the average raised? to 56, but the max lowered to 62. idk.

those numbers were the high two cores of the 4.

question: why do you think core 1 & 2 would be the same, but higher than core 3 & 4? by about 5 degrees each.

 

one last thing, i just wanted to make sure that when you initially suggested CPU FSB of 1.3v, that should be the same thing as the settng of "CPU VTT Voltage" that I am changing on my board right?

well, just got done with a third test. hope i'm going in the right direction with this stuff?
360mhz FSB
1.375 vcore
1.2 cpu vtt voltage

average temp was 51 with a max of 57.

i guess i should keep going lower. but the cpu vtt v is as low as it can go, before it goes back to auto? should i keep going lower with the vcore?

 

Seems like nice results. I too managed to clear a few hours of prime95 at 366/1,375 settings (didn't bother more), though my temps where a bit higher. However, some applications still crashed (Crysis for example), so I am at 360/1,380 right now and I intend to stay there. So just because you clear a certain amont of hours in prime95 doesn't mean it will work out perfectly. How long you should run Prime95 in order to claim "stability" is a matter of taste, some say 24 hour, others say a lot less.

Sure you can try to lower your vcore but not with those temps, no need IMO (You are running 4 instances of Prime95, one per core???). Just stay where u are and enjoy the extra stability. Try to fiddle around a bit with different torture tests on different cores. Do the "In-place large FFT:s" on all 4 cores to max temps. Otherwise, I prefer to do "blended" on 1 core, and the above on the other 3.

My recommendation since you promote stability and durability, don't change anything. You have a nice overclock of around 35% and got a frequency exceeding the really expensive quads at stock, so why bother.

Some computer-wiz may give you a detailed description of why core 1 and 2 are running about 5 degrees hotter than 3 and 4. I cannot, I can just say it is normal (btw, the cores are actually named 0,1,2,3). Your temps seems almost to good to be true (at least to me), please confirm that u get those after a few hours of 4-instance prime. If that is the case, congrats, you have gotten a much better OC-ing set than I have.
/J

 

thanks again. i didn't get your message until just now, but i have been doing a torture test on some new voltages for the past 3 hours. but i want to make sure that i am running prime95 completely right. i dont know which version of prime95 you are running, but i am running 25.5, and it is supposed to automatically test all 4 cores, and when i start it, it asks me how many worker threads i want to run, so i put in 4. run the task manager, and sure enough, all 4 are running 100%.

anyways, the numbers i gave you before were from everest using its stability test like you suggested. right now i took a big leap down in vcore just to see what would happen. i put it at 1.3375. i have been running the prime95for a few hours on small FFTs, and monitoring the temps with coretemp. i am sitting at 58 58 52 52.

let me know what you think? should i put it back up to where it was at? or retest that voltage with prime95? let me know, later jerk

 

p.s. check out this link if you haven't seen it, its a pretty decent article i think

http://forums.techpowerup.com/showthread.php?t=32778

 

alright, well, i guess i'm where i'm going to stay at unless tonights torture tests prove otherwise, or you think it would be wise to up the voltage to where it was.

360fsb
1.3375 vcore
1.2 cpu vtt volatage
after testing a 4 hour cycle with prime95, temps sat at ahigh of 58 58 54 54
aftr 4 hour cycle with everest, it was 51 51 47 47
so these temps sound good. i'll doa 24 hour test with prime 95, but i thinki'm good to go. now i have to look at overclocking memory!

let me know what anyone thinks

 

Sounds lika absolutely fantastic temps and voltage on that overclock. Gratz. You could probably get a lot more out of that CPU if you wanted to, even though the limit seems to come quite suddenly when you reach it. I have the same figures u have exept Vcore is 1,38 and temps 63, 63, 58, 58 (watercooled ). Again, I clear Prime95 with lower voltage but not Crysis while gaming.

If all apps works with that voltage there is no need to increase it. If something crashes along the road, a small increase is often enough.

I haven´t worked with OC:ing memory that much but a few rules of thumb is that you cant clock memory nearly as much as cpu:s, and you have to more careful with voltage. I would personally never exceed a +10% increase in neither speed nor voltage. There is also a point trying to get the memory to work at the same frequency as the cpu. That means that it could be a point in dropping the frequency on the memory of a 800 Mhz DDR2 (actual frequency of 400) memory to 720 (360) on a set-up that has a 360 FSB cpu. Or, setting the cpu/ram rate to 7/8 on a rig with a 350 mhz FSB cpu with the same memory. Lower frequencies on the memory generally enables lower latencies as well. I am not sure to what point the trade-offs are worth it though.

Also, see the RAM-manufacturers website. With a little luck, you will see that your ram has been tested at lower latencies than your BIOS has set it to. Be aware though that higher speed often equals higher latencies, so the tested latencies may not be accurat once you have OC:d the RAM. If you are highly dependent on RAM, check out a program called "Memtest". It's a bit of a hassle since u have to boot it from disk (standalone program). Personally never tried it but from what I can gather, it is the best memorytester. Both "CPU-Z" and "memset" will reveal the speed and latency setting of your current RAM. "SiSoft Sandra" can benchmark your memory. You get a couple of diagrams comparing your setup to other typical rigs. This is more to see if anything is really wrong, plus to compare to your own results after you have OC:d.

Though your GPU and mine isn't really comparable, it would be fun to see what u would score in 3DMark06 (free version available). Post the score if you try it will you?
/J

 

first, i'd deff love to run that 3dmark06, i'll do that sometime today.

one last question, it seems that all the warning signs people spoke of as fas as an unstable system go, were (1) not POSTing, (2) prime95 actually telling you there was an error, (3) not booting up or not booting windows, or maybe some other drastic and obvious way that it is unstable. But what about freezing up? Yesterday while I was starting prime95, i started cpu-z to see something, and bam, it froze up. Then this morning I woke up and prime95 had went for quite sometime, but the comp was frozen. so i just restart it, and it seems like no problem.

i would assume this is considered a symptom of an unstable computer also right?

also, as for the RAM, yes, I would much rather lower the latencies of the RAM rather than OC it. It is DDR2 1000 (PC2-8000). i think that i would much rather try to lower the latencies than oc it. plus, i hear it yields better performance in the trade off.

ok, post that score lata

 

hey, i just ran the test to see if my computer was compatible with the 3Dmark06, it says that it's not due to the fact that
(1) I have windows xp pro 64bit running, and it needs vista. and
(2) "• Your display card is significantly more powerful in raw performance
Your display card fails the following requirements:
• Pixel Shader 4.0, you have 3.0"

so i dont think i'll be running 3d mark damn it!

that sucks

 

ok, so now i'm getting worried. i run prime last night, and it ends up freezing at 20hours. so i think ok, bump it up from the 1.375 and 1.2cpu that i had it at, to 1.3875 and 1.3cpu. i start prime95 and walk away for a while. i come back in like a couple hours and find that it had been sitting at 66-67 for a while. i dont know what happened? i only bumped it up a little, and i've had it there before, that was the strange thing. and now, even if i bump it down to like 1.375/1.25 like i had it all last night, it jumps staight up to like 65-66, rather than like 58-59 which it sat at for liek 20 hrs.

so what do you think happened? think i screwed something up permanently? ****, i hope not...

 

Dunno what happened dude, but those temps seem more like the ones I have. Cant say why it is hotter now than before. Have u changed anything (like changed program for monitoring temps or voltage)?

I really have no idea what happened but for that overclock/volts on air, those temps are pretty normal. Strange you got others before though. Be careful to run the same processes in Prime, as different processes on all 4 cores can easily give a 5 degree difference. Apart from that, I am clueless.

I have moved down even more and am at 350fsb now, with lower voltage. That gives me much nicer temps and it its still faster than a $1000 quad so...

Another thing to put the fiddling in perspective: Having the window a bit open in my room while I game has the same impact on cpu-temps as an extra fan for the water-cooling , and its cheaper/easier.

I am at 37,37,40,43 idle and 58,58,62,63 under load right now while stable in everything I throw at it @ 3,15 GHz so I will officially stop fiddling now.

 

alright, that sounds good. guess maybe i'll have to lower mine too. it sucks, but at least i'm average now. i swear there were so many tests that it did great, then BAM! but oh well. anyways, thank for the help, i appreciate it. hows that watercooling doing for ya? i'm so afraid of it leaking??!!

 

random lockups

I've been fiddling with my b3 q6600 for a couple weeks now (bought it last summer, only recently started oc'ing it). It's in an EVGA 680i LT board and I've been having a couple of problems. First, it's difficult to get it past ~2.8ghz in a functional state (Boot, etc.) Second, any oc at all and it will run full load for about 8 hours and then the system will freeze. I run seti@home on this comp, and the decrease in workunit computation time is quite noticeable at even more modest oc's (currently 2.66). This 2.8ghz wall, and the system freezing are frustrating. Any advice on other's experiences with this stepping/board combo would be greatly appreciated

My specs
Intel Q6600 B3
Clocked at 2.66 temps:
Cores: ~54C
CPUTIN: ~44C
VCore: 1.240v
I did the pencil mod on the mb, so no vDroop
Thermaltake V1 Cooler in Antec P180 case (cpu fan exhausts straight up into another (120mm) case exhaust fan on the top of the case
FSB voltage set to auto (believe it's 1.2v)
temps, voltages from CPUID Hardware Monitor (Speedfan reports ~12C cooler, going with higher reported temps) CPU-Z and Core Temp

I think I found the culprit! After reading this review at xbitlabs, my TT V1 is apparently incapable of cooling oc'd quad core procs. I wish I'd done this research before I bought it! Fortunately, it's worked fine for the past 10 months of running stock clocks and I believe I got my moneys worth out of it, however, looks like I'll need a new cooler.

 

Hi all,

I recently bought these components:

XFX nForce 680i SE SLI Socket 775 Motherboard
Intel Quad Core Kentsfield 2.4Ghz Q6600 CPU
(4)Corsair 1024MB DDR2 @ 800MHz

I also have from old PC (1) GeForce 8500 GT 512MB PCIe **

** I Will be upgrading this video card soon to the following one:

(2x)EVGA GeForce 8800 GT Video Card - Superclocked Edition, 512MB GDDR3, PCI Express 2.0, SLI Ready, (Dual Link) Dual DVI, HDTV, Video Card

My question is, how do I over clock the Q6600 with the SLI ready ram. I am new to this Over Clocking and don't want to screw up.

Any help would be most appreciated.

Thanks

 

I made a slight mistake here , it should read >> XFX nForce 680i LT SLI Socket 775 Motherboard <<

 

Aanaddor, I have very simmilar set up, XFX nForce 680i LT SLI, Q6600, 4Gbs Corsair DDR2 @ 800 MHz, BFG 8800GT 512.

Upped my FSB to 1334 Mhz
unlinked Mem Clock
Mem Bus set@ 814Ghz ,shows 800.4 Mhz
CPU volts set @ 1.42 v shows 1.36v
Mem volts set 1.9
FSB Volts set 1.4

PassMark Performance test 1475 @ above settings

Keep an eye on your temps CPU is up to 68 under load.
Looking for better cooler than my bogo intel one any sujestions welcome.

 

I'm 2 years late but it doesnt matter ^^

Great overtclock of 3.6Ghz with a Q6600 G0 and a Asus P45-P5Q, on air cooling (Mugen 2 Rev B)
34-40 Idle 52-56 load depending of the airflow
Bus Speed 400
Multiplier X9
FSB 1600 1.24v
Vcore 1.488 bios 1.47 windows
Mem 960mhz 5-5-5-15 5:6
NB 1.22v
SB 1.10v

I think it is the Maximum stable on air cooling, can go in windows at 3.8 but 5sec of LinX and the CPU jump to 75c.

 

You sure were limited by bad PSU and your Ram Speed.
My Quad wants to wake up at 3,95Ghz but heat makes it sleep again
LOL!!
I got Corsair Dominator Modules DDR2-1066Mhz
Actually is running at 3,2Ghz.
http://valid.canardpc.com/show_oc.php?id=2034782
Ram is actually at 1000Mhz because shitty mobo doesn't like running more then 1000Mhz Ram Speed.

 

Looking forward to see what is possible with a G0 stepping Q6600.