Hey all, I'm looking to try and overclock my i7 930, aiming to get to around 4Ghz. My problem is I don't have a clue where to start. Its been years since I've done any overclocking so I'm a bit out of my depths. Anyone have any tips or guides for making the process a bit more simple?
So I've done a slight OC but my temps are a tad on the high size. Around 80 when under load, around 55 when idle. Is this ok? I've just done a slight OC 3.5 Ghz but with stock voltage. Currently running prime95 torture test and it seems ok so far. Any tips?
Check your case has decent airflow and what cooler have you got? Edit: just noticed you have a true in your sig
I've just got TRUE. My case doesn't have the best airflow, got a Xigmatek Midgard. I'm planning on upgrading my whole rig soonish so I may buy a new case before picking up a whole new rig
Stock voltage or auto voltage? Big difference there, and could explain your temps, assuming you have adequate cooling. For a fast and dirty overclock, bung 1.3v through the cpu, set the multi at 20, and the base clock at 200; leave everything else at auto, disable spread spectrum and enable load line calibration. 930s are D0 steppers, so it'll probably do that speed with less vcore, but it's a reasonably safe bet 1.3 will be enough. You can tweak and experiment afterwards.
I'll give it ago. Also I'm an idiot, forgot to plug my fan controller back in after installing the new cpu, that would be one reason the temps are a bit high. Edit, yeah auto voltage
unforunately it doesn't post at 200 base clock and multi of 20 with vcore at 1.3V. Edit i tell a lie, Disabled Turbo boost and now I'm sitting at 40C idle. Time for abit of prime testing. Edit: Keeps crashing in prime
Yea I'll try again this evening and up the vcore abit each time, could just be I've abit of a poort chip for overclocking
You can check the CPU vid by returning everything to stock settings and running CPUz to get a read on the voltage under load.
The setting's I used for all my X58 based chip's were all the same to start with and then I just tweaked them based on how they managed to cope in Prime. BLCK: 200 CPU Multi: 20 Dram: 1600Mhz (or whatever speed it was) CPU Vcore: 1.275 (increased if needed or lowered if not needed to be that high) QPI Voltage: 1.325 (increased if needed or lowered if not needed to be that high) Dram Votlage: 1.65v (lower if it was 1.5v or higher if it was higher voltage ram) If windows failed to boot regardless of voltage at that Blck then I would knock it down to 190 and try it, then increase by 1 value each time etc and generally I could have a stable clock working from those settings in a couple of days, due to leaving prime running for a minimum of 8 hours. If it booted with no problems at those settings then I would start to increase slowly till it failed and then I would test at the last bootable settings and so on.
Sorry just realised the end of my previous post was abit detail shy and should of said the following. If I was happy with the speed at X Voltage I would then start lowering the voltage and then testing each time until it became unstable. If I wanted more speed, then I would start to bump up the BLCK if the board could handle it and test it again, but also if needed increasing the voltage until the temp's got to my limit which was between 70c and 80c per core. I found that all the cpu's I had would do atleast 4.0ghz based on a Rampage II Extreme board, however in the Gigabyte EX58 Extreme board, they would all do 4.2ghz and it was only my cooling letting me down. My 950 would do up to 4.5ghz in the Rampage II Extreme, but the temp's were to high and I set it to a stable 4.2ghz in the end and left at that.
Cheers I'll check it out. I think I may need to resit my heatsink + get a new fan for it. The fan seems to be running at 100% all of the time, I'm just using a Xigmatek fan I had sitting about but its getting really really loud. Any recommendations? I'm thinking a NF-F12 from noctua?
I'm back at everything stock out of the box factory settings and I'm getting some really weird issues with it let alone overclocked. If sounds like the CPU fan is on at 100% all of the time, temps aren't very high with the true at around 42 idle. Stability issues in games etc. Probably a stupid question but could installing a new GPU cause my CPU fans to freak out or something? Edit: Strangely enough when running prime the CPU is actually quieter than it is at idle!