Whats the difference?

[LordHood2]

Something I've been trying to get is the performance difference of voltage increases/decreases when overclocking the CPU. My (limited) basic knowledge says that "the higher the clock, the better the performance. period". I see people with clocks that identical, but the voltages are slightly different.

Say there are two identical CPUs, both clocked to 4.2Ghz. CPU A is at 1.39v, CPU B is at 1.5v. What would be the differences in said CPUs as far as performance in a gaming environment? I'm just trying to get the hang of OCing and to understand why you do what you do and dont do what you dont do.

Also, if there are any suggested articles I should read, please share. I would be most appreciative.

[supaflyx3]

Voltage has nothing to do with performance per-say, its for stability. No 2 CPUs are alike and some will require more voltage than others.

[LordHood2]

So based on that alone, it does come down to the clock speed only as far as performance is concerned?

[supaflyx3]

Correct, that is the basis of overclocking the CPU.

[LordHood2]

Gotcha, I wasn't sure. I'm starting to have little hicups in my games with my current set up, just trying to root out causes.

[Perineum]

Test your overclock for longer, see if it's stable.

In my opinion test for longer than 8 hours for final OC settings. I've had a few fail in and around that time.

If it's not stable, up your voltage to make it stable at that same OC setting.

[LordHood2]

Well I've tested my current OC for about 4 hours, and everything seemed fine. I'm more concerned with graphical performance being behind what I think it should be/ is capable of being.

[bigFOIG]

Overclocking your CPU really doesn't affect the performance of your gaming by too much so if you're having problems with your game, I would check up with your GPU first.

[sswilson]

Slight "hickups" might be caused by NB/FSB requiring a slight bump in voltage.

Under XP there used to be a point during the initial splash screen where you could see a slight pause / "hickup" that was noticably more pronounced if your NB was struggling with the extra strain of the OC. In that case, a slight NB V bump would often resolve the issue.

I suppose it's more of a "feeling" thing, but I find a huge difference in how fast an OC'd rig boots once the NB volts are dialed in properly.

[Dead Things]

Originally Posted by LordHood2

Say there are two identical CPUs, both clocked to 4.2Ghz. CPU A is at 1.39v, CPU B is at 1.5v. What would be the differences in said CPUs as far as performance in a gaming environment?

The greater the vcore, the greater the electromagnetic interference (EMI) within the CPU due to clockgen pulses. Enabling Spread Spectrum in BIOS is meant to modulate EMI by varying CPU speed accordingly, usually something around +/-0.5%. But Spread Spectrum both reduces clock-for-clock performance and lowers the overclock ceiling. So in an overclocked environment, Spread Spectrum should almost always be disabled. Hence, in your scenario, the one with the lower vcore will usually outperform the one that needs higher vcore since it will suffer from less interference. This can usually be illustrated fairly clearly with benchmarks such as SuperPi or wPrime, but whether or not the difference in performance would translate into an experiential difference when gaming may not be quantifiable. Suffice to say, the best vcore for any given overclock is the lowest possible vcore while maintaining the required level of stability.