1st Ever OC - FutureMarks Before & After

[misterlarry]

Well I finally bit the bullet and decided to try it out. Baby steps at first. The first pic is FutureMarks @ stock 3.0 GHz



The second one is with the cpu only OC @ 3.6 GHz (20%)



In FutureMarks it represents a 6.27% increase overall. Got a little greedy and tried to take it higher today, but that didn't work. Almost thought that my new Win XP 64 install had gone the way of the Dodo. More reading and testing before I go any further.

I haven't been able to find a way to access memory timings in the Ga-P35-Ds3l bios yet. Any ideas? Currently at 800 MHz and 5-5-5-15 timings. Thanks everyone for getting me this far.

[1Tanker]

To get advanced settings(timings, voltages, etc.), just hit Ctrl+F1 at the same time. Might take a few tries to get it right... the selector will go up to the top when done properly. GL

[misterlarry]

Thanks Tanker. I was trying ctrl & F11 and not getting anywhere? Doh. Anyways, I did an OCCT run overnight and everything was reported as stable and all voltages were slightly above minimums except for 5v which was about 4.8v.

The ram settings were actually 5-5-5-18. So now the bios still shows the ram as 800 MHz and I've changed the timings to 4-4-4-12 and bumped voltage 0.4v. The 5v is still low as shown in the OCCT that I'm running right now.



Now I'm hoping to wrap my head around the electrical knowledge portion of OCing (electrical has always been my Achilles heel), please humor me. I'm wondering what all the different ram columns mean in CPUZ also. I see that one represents my current settings, but what are the other three?



Thanks everyone!

[SugarJ]

Those ram columns are the SPD settings in your sticks. Every manufacturer has preset values that the sticks report to the mobo so they will boot with the auto settings. They are usually lower than the actual rated spec's of the sticks so that the ram will boot with a wider ranger of mobos with default voltages(1.8 - 1.85V). The DS3L board only picks up the JEDEC codes I think, so that's why it defaulted to 5-5-5-18. SLI boards seem to pick up the EPP settings.

Clear as mud? Set your timings and vDimm manually. Your ram will probably need 2.2V (or +.4V) in order to run at the rated timings.

You will probably have to raise your MCH and other voltages a notch or two in order to push this combo up to 4.0Ghz and beyond. At least I did. I'm running at a vCore setting of 1.37 something 24/7, which reports back at 1.31v under load.

[misterlarry]

Thanks SugarJ. I learned a long time ago that any number of people could think me an idiot, but if I wanted to prove it, all I needed to do was open my mouth. I've got prime95 x64 running right now (probably for most of the day). I'll post it here later. My previous session had the 5-5-5-18 timings for the memory and was stable.

Right now the bios shows my ram at 800 MHZ so that is what I've got it set to. My question is; in order to get to 4.0 GHz what order should I proceed with the following four variables (perhaps more)?

1) increasing vcore
2) increasing chip set voltages
3) increasing memory speed towards 1066+
4) increasing FSB towards 4.0 GHz
5) ???

Another question: What does the 5v power supply and is the fact that mine is low (4.8v) a concern?

Thanks again everyone.

[SugarJ]

Originally Posted by misterlarry

Right now the bios shows my ram at 800 MHZ so that is what I've got it set to. My question is; in order to get to 4.0 GHz what order should I proceed with the following four variables (perhaps more)?

1) increasing vcore
2) increasing chip set voltages
3) increasing memory speed towards 1066+
4) increasing FSB towards 4.0 GHz
5) ???

Another question: What does the 5v power supply and is the fact that mine is low (4.8v) a concern?

In reverse order - don't worry about your 5V, the chips will actually run as low as 3V if I remember correctly. Anything within 10% is well inside of tolerances.

Your memory speed is set as a multiple of your bus speed. (accessed by using Ctrl-F1 to get to advanced options on this mobo). Right now it is set at 2.0. (2x400=800). As you increase your bus speed, your mem speed will automatically increase. e.g. 9x425=3.825Ghz, your memory would run at 2x425=850. Or you can increase your memory multiplier to 2.4 and get 2.4x425=1020mhz, but you'll probably have to relax timings to the 1066 settings.

Here's how I would proceed.
Increase bus speed 20mhz. If not stable, increase chipset voltage +.1V. If still not stable, bump vCore 2 notches. If still not stable, bump vCore again. Watch your temps. NEVER GO OVER 1.4V!!!. I'll check all my settings at home tonight, let you know where I'm at.

[sswilson]

I've found that if I kept the memory low enough to be out of the picture, and using small bumps to fsb, failure to boot into windows (stalls during loading bar) often points towards chipset voltages, while failure during prime more often points to vcore.

It's not a perfect system, but it's worked fairly well for me. Once you've played with the system a while, you should start to get a feel for what the different errors are pointing you towards.

[misterlarry]

Had an error at these memory timings. Should I set them back to 5-5-5-18?



Can't find stress.txt file anywhere.

[misterlarry]

On my machine, prime95 (x64) isn't installed; it simply runs from the executable in the folder that I unzipped it to. The other text files are there, but no "stress.txt". Think I'll run it again at the same settings and see what happens. Thanks.

[SugarJ]

Originally Posted by misterlarry

Had an error at these memory timings. Should I set them back to 5-5-5-18?

What's your memory voltage set at? It should be at +.4V. Check your vDimm with Everest or HWmonitor. It might be below 2.1V, this mobo is known for vDrop/vDroop issues.

I think you're probably running into a vCore issue, you're at a 20% OC with stock voltages right? Your CPU probably needs a bit more juice.

Also, what bios version are you using?