My turn to ask for help
 

Ok, I can not get anything more than 3.6GHZ out of this E3110..... No clue why

Essentially, I can boot up no problems at 500FSB and 7X multi, but once i go to give my CPU some volts and try to get 8 or 9X multi's, the system will not even power on or post, and I need to reset the Cmos. Such a pain in the arse. I have tried tons of combinations:

400 x 9 works fine, 3.6GHZ stock voltage
425 x 9 nothing, no boot, no post
425 x 8 works great, no problem
450 x 8 once again, no problems, stock volts.
500 x 8 Nope, nada again.
500 x 7 Works perfect, stock volts (well nb V is up there at 1.59)

I have tried anywhere from 1.3-1.45V to get 4GHZ but no luck. I would at least expect to get a POST but I can't. When I hit the power button, the lights come on for half a second then it shuts off. So I hit the power button again, same thing over and over again.


Specs are in my Sig, I am using the latest BIOS, and have heard of no one yet with this problem, went through tons of pages on Xtremesystems official DFI X38 page....UGH

Have you had another CPU on this motherboard?

I also noticed it's a DFI board.... does it have a VTT voltage setting? I have to bump that up on my Dark to get higher clocks on the cpu.

Yes I have run other CPU's in it. Q6600 had no problems getting to 3.6, but I guess once again that was a 9X multi with 400fsb.

Yes, this board has VTT. I experimented with it, default is 1.1, I rose it to 1.4 and still same problem.

I'm running a bit higher than that (needed it for both the E6600 & the E6420) but be warned..... AFAIK this is an internal CPU voltage and too much could fry the chip.

I'd have to look back at the DFI Dark overclocking guide I had originally, but seems to me that voltage is directly related to how well the CPU can "handshake" with the chipset at higher CPU clockspeeds.

I just double checked, and I've got it cranked to 1.575 :shok:

Probably not healthy, but it's been running fine for a year so far......... :)

Hmmmm well, I guess I will have to check that out.... Geeze, DFI makes some awesome boards, but makes me really really love my other Maximus for it's easy to understand BIOS!

Interesting. I attempted to boot up at 3.8~ GHZ, and gave myself a bunch of VTT, 1.4V. Same problem, however, this time it powered up for about a second longer than the short bursts of before. So I then changed it down to 1.25V, and I am about 10 minutes in Prime95 testing! Seems like I might be on to something.... Too much doesnt work, and too little doesnt work either.... Going to be a PAIN to find the sweet spot!!

Heh.... that's the "joy" of a DFI board. Takes some work to find the sweet spot.... :)

I was actually disapointed at how easy it was to overclock with the Gigabyte Bios.

Ok benching fine at 3.9GHZ now, but anything higher gives me problems. I don't know what to blame, CPU? Motherboard? I mean, this is supposed to be a killer board...... and these CPU's, even the worst, should get more than 4GHZ easy...

Bleh. Maybe I'll just break down and get a X3350...... My board does 500+FSB without a sweat, must be this CPU.....