Before we get to any clocking, there are a couple photos of the insulation, phase mount, and shots of the rig in action with the various video cards.
click for full size...
I initially had some issues with my phase mount, the area around the CPU is extremely small compared to AM2 and X58...apparently. I had to shave a lot off of my insulation on the phase change evaporator. I had been using the same setup for years from 775 to AM2 to X58, but this board needed a good trimming to fit. For those wondering, using a couple 775 holes and a couple 1366 holes works likes a champ in getting the new 1156 mounted...Intel still needs a kick in the ass for not making the holes the same as 775. It is a simple cash grab for CPU heat sink manufacturers and nothing more...don't even pretend it has anything to do with mount pressure, 775 is almost identical as the new 1156 and changing it is a slap in all users faces by Intel. Yes, that topic pisses me off in case you haven't figured that out ;). Time for some results :up:
2D Benchmark Results click for full size...
The 32M and 1M top clocks were pretty decent, but I certainly didn't have a stellar chip. Max BCLK I could work with is
245 BCLK with this board so I had room to play a bit with higher mem clocks while lowering CPU multi. In the end, the 21X multi ran better for single threaded apps so that stuck for SPi. The fast 32M time could definitely be improved as that was one of the first things I ran, literally 30 minutes after having set the system up. I'll run again with tightened timings including RTL and B2B CAS latency soon enough.
Gigabyte GTX 260 OC Results click for full size...
The single GTX 260 result is for 01 as the 295 just sucks with i5/i7. The 260 is not much better but I did manage to crack 93K with relatively low CPU clocks. It became apparent this CPU was going to be pretty limited as far as what I could get for clocks out of it. Being able to run almost 1.6v on my weak single stage phase for single threaded benches led me to believe LN2 wouldn't bring a whole heck of a lot of gains.
EVGA GTX 295 Results
Ummm, yeah, this section is going to be blank for a couple days. Some idiot ran a few benches last night then formatted the drive before pulling the screens off :shakes:. Needless to say, I need a couple days to get the whole cycle of hardware set so the 295 can go on this board with the phase for CPU cooling.
2 x MSI R4890 Cyclone OC Results click for full size... 3DMark 05 with the two MSI R4890 Cyclones is where I started the party with this board. The first screen shot above is simply showing the 245 BCLK stability. I can boot at 245 BCLK, but can't run squat a single clock higher. Either these chips have very hard BCLK walls or there is a MB limitation happening there. The second screen shot above is simply a 4GHz run and the final is at max clocks on the SS of 4788MHz.
click for full size... Max 06 CPU clocks achieved were 4640MHz and max AM3 CPU clocks were 4700MHz flat. Overall, the chip I have is pretty weak, or at least based on my expectations. Maximum memory clocks achieved were somewhere in the 1175MHz ~ 1185MHz (DDR3-2350 ~ DDR3-2370) range for useable dual channel in 3D or SPi. Hopefully more work on B2B CAS latency and RTL's will yield higher useable memory clocks.