Completely new in AMD CPU. Need some advise on overclocking.

[razibhasan]

Hello ...
I've bought a AMD System (My first AMD CPU) about 1 month ago. For the last five years I've used Intel system. I never overclocked before. So, I am not tha much familiar on overclocking. However, after getting my new AMD CPU I've overclocked a little bit (after reading some guides).

Well my current system is ...

AMD Athlon64 X2 3800+
MSI K8N Neo4 Platinum
2*512MB Kingstone HyperX PC3200 RAM (Details Here)
6800GS 256MB PCI-E
Thermaltake 500Watt PSU (Details Here)
160GB Hitachi SATA II
120GB Seagate SATA

My current overclocking is;
2.40GHz @ 240HTT @ 3X Multiplier @ 166Mhz Memclock Index and 1T Timing. (memory voltage has been increased to 2.70).

I've monitored the temparature as well. When its idle it stays around 37C - 39C. And at full load (When I ran Prime95's Torture test @ 10 priority) the temparature was 47C - 52C.

My questions are;
#1. Are those temparature reasonable?
#2. One of my friends said my processor could burn. How safe is my overclocking?
#3. Can I do anything else (from your point of view to get the best result)?

My full details (from bios) has been given below ...

Cell Menu>>

High Performance Mode Manual
Aggressive Timing Disable
Dynamic Overclocking Disable
Adjust CPU FSB Bus 240
HT Frequency 3x
HT Width ?16 ?16
X CPU Spread Spectrum Disable
SATA Spread Spectrum Disable
PCI-E Spread Spectrum Disable
SSE/SSE2 Instruction Disable
Cool n? Quite Disable
Adjust CPU Ratio StartUp
Adjust CPU VID StartUp
Extra CPU Voltage StartUp
X CPU Voltage 1.350V
Memory Voltage 2.70V
NF4 Voltage 1.50V



Advanced Chipset Features >> DRAM Configuration

Timing Mode Manual
Memclock index value (Mhz) 166Mhz
CAS# Latency (Tcl) 2.5
Min RAS# active time (Tras) Auto
RAS# to CAS# delay (Trcd) Auto
Row Precharge time (Trp) Auto
Row to Row delay (Trrd) Auto
Row cycle time (Trc) 12T
Row refresh cyc time (Trfc) 24T
Read-to-Write time (Trwt) Auto
Write recovery time (Twe) Auto
Write to Read delay ((Twtr) Auto
Refresh Period (Tref) Auto
User Config Mode Manual
Bottom of 32-bit [31:24] IO D0
1T/2T Memory timing 1T
Read Preamble value 6ns
Async Latency value 6ns
S/W memory hole Remapping Disabled
H/W memory hole Remapping Disabled
MTRR mapping mode Continuous



Please try to give me some advise. Your words will be appreciated.

Thanks

 

[acegazda]

check out this its a great thread. Should answer most if not all of your questions.

 

[Billb2]

It is well beyond the scope of any post to explain, in any detail, how to overclock a cpu, much less memory and graphics cards too.This is the short version...the "medium Size" version would be 300 pages...soooo

Over clocking is done by changing the FSB. The speed of the processor is determined by the FSB and "Multiplier"...FSB X Multiplier = CPU speed.
But, there's a problem, Memory speed is also controlled by FSB, so, when you speed up the CPU by increasing FSB you also speed up the memory. The FSB also controls data to and from Hard disks, CD drives, Sound cards, etc.

The FSB is like a conveyor belt running from one building to another. Say you've been working on some mechanical prototype gizzmo and now want to send it to Frank at the headquarters building. You put it on the conveyor, call Frank and say "Frank, I put that prototype I've been working on for the last three weeks on the conveyor. I should be there in 10 minutes. Please be sure to be there to catch it, because if it falls off the end of the conveyor it will be wrecked." Frank says "OK, I'll be sure to be there in 10 minutes. ...All is good. Then Joe, the maintenance guy, notices that the conveyor drive motor is set on low speed. He, seeking to keep the company running at top efficiency( ie overclocked!), resets the speed to fast. Five minutes later you prototype falls off the ends of the conveyor.

I said FSB X Multi = CPU speed, But FSB X Divider = memory speed. It's like a conveyor on a conveyor...gets complicated, huh? There's more.
There's HyperTrasnsport frequency also (HTT). All these things FSB, Multiplier, Memspeed, divider, and a whole slew of other stuff is all interrelated in strange and mysterious ways.

The typical method for learning to overclock is to "Read the Stickies"
Here's a few. DO NOT read them all, you'll go stark raving mad! Pick one or two that appeal to you and read the "general" sections about OCing.
http://www.overclock.net/overclock.p...king-guide.htm
http://forums.extremeoverclocking.co...d.php?t=151373
http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=263753
http://www.lostcircuits.com/advice/bios2/6.shtml
http://www.dfi-street.com/forum/showthread.php?t=20823
http://i4memory.com/showthread.php?t=327
http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=795444

Next you'll need some software:

General, information about your system..
CPU-Z: http://www.cpuid.com/cpuz.php
AMD Calculator v1.0.0.1: http://www.pcreview.co.uk/forums/thread-2337566.php
SiSoftSandra (Fee): http://www.sisoftware.net/

Temperature monitoring...
ASUS Probe is pretty good.
MotherBoardMonitor: http://mbm.livewiredev.com/
SpeedFan: http://www.almico.com/speedfan.php

Memory setting/testing...
A64Tweaker: http://files.extremeoverclocking.com/file.php?f=106
A64Info: http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...ad.php?t=96678

Testing...
3DMark06: http://www.futuremark.com/
Memtest86: http://www.memtest86.com/
SuperPi mod: http://www.xtremesystems.com/pi/

There's more, alot more, but these are the basics.

Good Luck.

 

[OCedHrt]

Seems like all the details have been covered pretty well already

I'm no expert, but I thought I'd point out that your temperatures look fine to me, although if you have the cash to spare I'd replace the retail hsf to get lower temps.

Your HTT seems a bit low as well, I think you should be able to run them at x4 just fine (240x4 < 1000).

No need to disable SSE/SSE2 either.

It doesn't seem like you need to overvolt your ram either since you are running them at stock speeds. 2000/166 = 12. 2400/12 = 200.

One other thing I've discovered is that to get high overclocks, you will need to manually set all those "Autos" under DRAM Configuration. Based on my experience with the A8R32, I think these Auto values are filled in by ther bios based on certain parameters and they're not always optimal.

Use a tool like A64Tweaker or whatever to get the Auto values when the board is running stock everything. Then, do your overclock and set those Auto values to what you copied down from A64Tweaker. Make sure you still run your ram at stock speeds otherwise these values will be useless. Your board could very well be different, but this is what I had to do to isolate my ram timings from CPU settings as the bios automatically adjusted poorly for specific dividers.