Overclocking diary No. 3: P35

Well, it’s that time again, where I bore you all with tales of my semi-competent overclocking. This time it’s time for Intel’s latest chipset, P35. This thread is locked, and any comments etc should go in this thread.

The rig is:

Intel Q6600 Core 2 Duo Quad, low power edition, G0 stepping.
Thermalright Ultra 120A cooler with 120mm 55cfm fan
Asus P5K-E WiFi AP motherboard
2 x 1GB OCZ PC2 1066 DDR RAM
BFG nVidia 8800GTX
2 x Maxtor DiamondMax20 80GB SATA HDDs in RAID 0
1x Maxtor DiamondMax20 80GB SATA HDD for data
2 x Samsung Writemaster SATA DVD-RW
On-board sound
Antec Nine Hundred case
Antec TruePower Trio 650W PSU

Windows PX Pro SP2, fully updated.

Benchmarks used:

CPU-Z v 1.41 for speeds
3DMark03, 05 and 06
SuperPI 1.5
ScienceMark 2
SiSoft Sandra Arithmetic, Multimedia and Memory Bandwidth benchmarks.

Stability testing with the above plus Orthos and the ever-popular TES IV: Oblivion.

Temperature monitoring is with Asus Probe.

9 October 07

Most of the settings for this board can be found under “Advanced” -> “Jumper Free”. Most things are set to Auto by default, so many have been left like that. In the cases where I have changed things a certain degree of guesswork has been involved as to what to set initially.

Those initial settings are:

AI Overclocking, CPU Ration control and DRAM Timing Control all set to Manual to unlock the various overclocking options.

CPU Ratio = 9
FSB Strap to Northbridge = Auto
FSB Freq = 266
PCI-E Freq = 100
DRAM Freq = 1067

Command Rate = 2T
CAS = 5
RAS -> CAS = 5
RAS Precharge = 5
RAS -> Active = 15

That is, RAM main timings are 2T, 5-5-5-15

RAS->RAS delay = 10
Row Refresh Cycle = 25

Write Recovery, Write to Read Delay, Read to Precharge, DRAM Static Read Control all = Auto

Transaction Booster = Disabled
Clock Overcharging Mode = Auto
CPU and PCI=E Spread Spectrum = Disabled

Under “CPU Configuration”, everything (such as C1E Support etc) is disabled.

CPU voltage = 1.2500
CPU Voltage Reference = Auto
CPU Voltage Damper = Enabled
CPU PLU Voltage = 1.6
DRAM Voltage = 2.00
FSB Term Voltage = 1.30V
Northbridge Voltage = 1.40V
Northbridge Voltage Reference = Auto
Southbridge Voltage = 1.05V

Where I have a rough idea what something does, I’ve set a value. The CPU and RAM voltages are roughly right (and if I set the RAM any higher Asus Probe doesn’t load properly – a sure sign of RAM instability. Other voltages are basically one notch above the lowest selectable. The RAM timings are ones I know work, as this is the RAM I was using in my Asus P5N32-E SLI until it started acting up (but the problem is the motherboard itself).

As usual, I ran a set of benchmarks to show baseline performance and to check stability. I also ran Oblivion for a couple of hours to test basic stability – still the most reliable test I know. Here are the initial benchmarks:

3DMark03 = 38958
3DMark05 =15551
3DMark06 = 12063

SuperPI (4M) = 1:51.938
ScienceMark = 1397.42
Sandra Arithmetic = 44707/30634
Sandra Multi-Media = 264715/143282
Sandra Memory Bandwidth = 5683/5695

Now, time to play…

From what I can tell Asus P5B is a horrible overclocker. Failed to overclock my celeron 420 and my new Q6600. Anyone overclock their Q6600 using Asus P5B.
Thanks

ok so i bought the asus f3s laptop, my processer speed is a 2.o but its only running around 1200, so i downloaded cpuz, its showing im set up at 199.5 for my bus speed but my multiplier is only at 6 clocks, sometimes hits 8 like atm, and every once in a while it will hit the 10 for my clock but its only for a brief second so i was wondering could this be a problem with the default clock speed, and if so would overclocking it fix it?

Heyz this one is for all you oc guru’s out there.. :)

I running at 400×8 to 3.2.. My vcore is set to 1.35.. When I run orthosx2 or prime95 for 15 mins my temps go up to 72 or 73 c.. I’m acutally okay with it since real world applications hardly ever stress the cpu to that limit but prime95 always fails after 30+ mins.. I don’t get it.. my system is stable.. Another weird thing is that Core temp 95.4 is reporting a freq of 3600mhz (450×8) and Orthos is reporting 3599MHz FSB: 400MHz [399MHz x 9.0 est.].. That’s pretty strange since I’m running at 400×8=3.2.. Cpu Z reports it 3200mhz, 8x, 400 bus & 1600 Fsb..

List of questions!

Another weird thing is I can’t run at 9×333.. I can at 332 or 334 but not 333..
Is running my ram at 1002 mhz better with a 2:3 faster or 800 mhz with a 1:1..
Oh and one last thing :D if prime fails after 30 + mins but orthos & my system overall runs fine should I care ??

thanks :)

Finally got down to OCing this thing.
Results are:

HTT:330mhz
HT Link:1225mhz
RAM:265mhz
CPU:2750mhz@1.40V

And final OC I set can be seen in the CPUZ validation link below

http://valid.x86-secret.com/show_oc.php?id=248310

Not bad eh?I think I extended my CPU life by another year maybe two.Now all I need are a couple raptys and a new DX 10 card and Ill be ready for anything :)

Just wanted to drop a note in here about the most recent article up on PC Perspective: http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=459

Let us know what you think!

Hello,

So I have been considering making the switch to water cooling as I am not satisfied with my air cooling temps when over-clocking my e6600.

I have been trying to find a relatively easy solution, and I was looking at the Koolance Exos 2 because I like the fact it is external. I have a Antec P182 case and I am concerned about fitting an internal setup.

I’ve had a couple people tell me that the Koolance systems are not very good, one of the main reasons is because they use copper water blocks but an aluminum radiator, which apparently is bad for some reason? Not sure if there is any truth to that.

Anyway, the reviews I’ve seen of the Koolance Exos 2 have all been pretty good, if not great.

Can anyone give me the real deal, and possibly make some recommendations?

I am looking to cool my CPU, Northbridge, and 8800GTS 640. (Not sure if I really need to cool the 8800GTS as I don’t plan on overclocking it. I could just get an aftermarket air cooler for this) but I do know my chipset gets extremely hot on this board (Gigabyte GA-965P S3)

Thanks

Off and on for the past 2 wks I’ve been overclocking the 5600. Ive made it to 3048mhz12×254, 2×1024 4-4-4-12-16 2T 2.1v(set at 333, cpuz reads 312) 380 after o/c, ht is 1014(2028). How far can ht be pushed over its 1000/2000 default and is the 5600 near the end as far as overclock mhz? Thanks

After doing a slight overclock on my Opteron processor….only to 2.5 gig I was wondering how accurate the nividia monitor utility is. When I run Orthos stress prime for a while the temp only goes up to 38c, the moment typing this it shows 26c but it is cold here this morning. I downloaded Speedfan and this seem to agree with the Nvidia software.

I am sort of hoping that the nvidia software is spot on and it seems I have a bit of room to go.

My CPU is running at 2.5 gig, my memory is at 415 mhz, 7-3-3 but I have not touched my video card.

Now that I have BioShock and Supreme Commander, it time to overclock
my system. It’s been awhile since I’ve tweaked my A7V133 so I’ve forgotten
a few things.

I’ll give you the specs:

MSI K8N Neo2 Platnium

2x 1GB Corsair PC3200UC2 DDR-200

X2 4400+ at 1.35v

GeForce 7800GS

SO, I’d like to oc..well… everything! CPU, RAM, and Video Card.
Are there any tweak programs that I should use?
Particular settings I should start at?

Finally, I tried to use an old MemTest CD and it won’t work with this
system. Is there an alternative?

Thanks

CE