Max Voltage for i7 920 D0?

[Sagath]

Originally Posted by bkh2

Oh alright, so it's not a badly seated block or anything... Would another rad help, or maybe just a better radiator/block combo? I just got a HAF 932 and was debating putting a dual rad on the side panel, or even going for a Magicool 480 rad (4x 120mm fans square rad).

Its likely not a rad issue, a 320 should be plenty for your setup. I would guess its just the GTZ not sucking the heat out and dumping it into the water fast enough. Only way to fix this would be a new block, I think.

The GTZ is starting to show its true thermal ability with these 130w chips overclocked

[Zero82z]

You can safely go up to 1.5V with an i5 or i7 CPU. As far as temperatures go, that's a different story. You'd need some hefty cooling to be able to cope with a heavily overclocked i7 CPU running with 1.5V.

Keep in mind that temperature-wise, you can go up to 100C (I recommend 90C at most though, so you leave yourself some headroom). It is normal for overclocked i7 CPUs to run in the 80s.

Originally Posted by ayah

Looks like Intel's official range is

.80V-1.375V

That's the VID range, not the safe voltage range. VID is the factory-set stock voltage, and the VID range simply means that every CPU coming out of Intel's factory has a stock voltage setting somewhere within that range (typical values for i7 CPUs are about 1.2V VID).

[gingerbee]

oh ya if you read through the intel pdf files it says 1.5 but for the most part you can't hurt anything at vid voltage range

[bkh2]

This was a while back when I first got the chip and was running Vista: http://www.sfu.ca/~bkh2/4GHZ.jpg

I'm gonna take a gander through the Intel PDF to make myself feel better about cranking the voltage up.

BTW, any advice on the RAM?

Originally Posted by Sagath

Its likely not a rad issue, a 320 should be plenty for your setup. I would guess its just the GTZ not sucking the heat out and dumping it into the water fast enough. Only way to fix this would be a new block, I think.

The GTZ is starting to show its true thermal ability with these 130w chips overclocked

I feel the air coming out of my rad and it's quite hot when I'm folding, so doesn't that mean that the CPU block is doing its job, whereas the rad is unable to keep up?

[Zero82z]

Originally Posted by bkh2

I'm gonna take a gander through the Intel PDF to make myself feel better about cranking the voltage up.

http://download.intel.com/design/pro...hts/320834.pdf

Page 22, Table 2-6 for the voltage, and Chapter 6 on page 71 for temperature info.

[ayah]

Originally Posted by Zero82z

http://download.intel.com/design/pro...hts/320834.pdf

Page 22, Table 2-6 for the voltage, and Chapter 6 on page 71 for temperature info.

But with the 1.375v being max stock voltage, that's pretty much a guaranteed 100% safe voltage if Intel will set it on their chips from the factory.

[bkh2]

Thanks for that link. It's exactly what I needed. Are you sure some shipped with a 1.375V stock? That seems very odd, but if it's true, I'd feel a lot better about pushing up my voltage to at least 1.25-1.3V.

[Sagath]

Originally Posted by bkh2

Thanks for that link. It's exactly what I needed. Are you sure some shipped with a 1.375V stock? That seems very odd, but if it's true, I'd feel a lot better about pushing up my voltage to at least 1.25-1.3V.

My guess is none shipped that high, no. But what it does mean is that due to the nature of manufacturing anything the engineers behind i7 have to design the chips within a tolerance of operation. That range caps out at 1.375. It just so happens the manufacturing process is better then expected so the tolerance max and never reached a VID of 1.375v on a retail processor.

Like any sort of advice, take it with a grain of salt. Its your chip and I'm not an Intel engineer. Do what you want, under your own risk.

That being said: From all the people on the net, and even these forums, Ive yet to hear of a chip dying due to being overclocked at even 1.4v. Assuming its being properly cooled. If you take the proper steps and stress test it properly you wont have any issues. Your screenshot shows a 2 min prime at 4ghz at 85c, to me this is NOT a sucessful 4ghz overclock. That chip would probably hit 100c after a bit of time, like oh, another 3 min . I know Id be crapping my pants if I clicked start on P95 and saw my temps jump to 85c

Anyways, the point is, we can tell you all we/you want that X volts is safe. But its up to you to do it under your own risk, because there is always some risk with ANY overclocking.

[matsta31]

great sumary sagath !

[Arinoth]

I was busy playing borderlands so i didn't see this thread until i saw Sagath's rather dead on/accurate summation of the volts/overclocking/temperatures.