E4300 @ 3.2 so far

[EvilRage]

So I just finished putting together my new C2D rig, which includes the following:

Silverstone TJ07 Black Windowed Case
PC Power & Cooling Silencer 750
Intel Core 2 Duo e4300 Allendale Batch# Q650A045
Thermalright Ultra-120 Extreme Heatsink w/Yate Loon D12SL-12 (push)
eVGA 680i n68-A1 Motherboard
OCZ DDR2 PC2-8500 SLI-Ready Memory
2x eVGA 7900 GTO
Creative X-fi Fatal1ty
150GB Raptor X

I read up a little bit on OCing, and so far haven't run into any issues. These C2Ds seem born to OC! I've been increasing the clock speed in 200MHz increments; I'll set it in the bios, reboot, then if it gets into Windows (hasn't failed yet) I'll open up speedfan and CPU-z and start running Orthos small fft.

At 2.8 GHz and 1.275v, the temps seem to be stabilizing around 53-54C (load). Still seems pretty cool to me, and it's idling at 32C or thereabouts. Ambient room temp is about 24C.

Now that I'm almost at 3GHz, I think I'm gonna back off on the large jumps in FSB and see how high this thing can get stable at - but I'm not too sure where to go next. I've never really OC'd before, so what kinds of freezing/crashing/lockups/etc do I have to expect?

I read that an easy way to do it is to keep increasing FSB; if Windows fails to boot, then up voltage until it works, then run Orthos to test stability. Repeat until either a) voltage gets too high for comfort, or b) Orthos crashes. Is that about right?

Can anyone else who has more experience with OCing offer some tips, helps, suggestions, etc? Thanks.

EDIT: Hmm, looks like voltage was set to auto. It's currently at 3.0 and 1.392v. I'm thinking I'll change the voltage to around 1.4 and keep increasing the FSB until I can't get into Windows.

EDIT2: Ran Orthos for a half hour on the 3.0 GHz OC and it seems OK (I'll run longer tests once I settle on a final OC, lol) and ran 3DMark06 to test stability there as well, and it seems solid. Also worth noting, I went from 6970 @ stock 1.8 to 10017 with the OC. Nice jump!

 

[math20]

So the only thing you had to change in BIOS was the fsb? I have to reset when I try to put it at 266

 

[EvilRage]

Originally posted by: math20
So the only thing you had to change in BIOS was the fsb? I have to reset when I try to put it at 266

The BIOS for the eVGA n68 mobo is actually really nice, there are lots of options and different ways to do things.

First I set the CPU Multi to 9. Then I disabled the C1E Enhanced Halt State, so I could see exactly where I was at with CPU-z. Next, I started increasing the FSB - I was paying attention to what the CPU Freq. was listed at. I went from 1.8 to 2.0, then kept going in 200MHz increments. I realized at 3GHz that the voltage was set to auto, so I locked down the voltages for the RAM (2.1) CPU FSB (1.4) SPP (1.4), MCP (1.5), and HTT SPP<->MCP (1.2). I also changed the voltage on the CPU from auto to 1.4250, so I could control the voltage and not fry anything by accidentally trying a higher OC and letting the voltage get too high. You can't be too careful, I guess.

 

[KeypoX]

thats pretty impressive OC ... you should be pretty happy with 3ghz stable... as far as errors, restarts are very common in my experience. when you get to high windows will not make it. And when its even worse the bios will not post. Also blue screens are not all that uncommon. Random lock ups common as well. And thats about it though i have had a windows or two corrupted before. And need to reinstall.

But thats about it but prolonged voltage increase will decrease the life of your cpu. But most people will not use them that long anyways. Unless you seriously overvolt then you can fry it pretty fast

 

[EvilRage]

It was stable on Orthos for over 2 hours; I set it up and ran it and then took a nap... was kinda waking up and -thought- I heard what sounded like a POST beep... so I woke up my monitor and looked at the temp in speedfan... 100C :Q

I don't get it, it had seemed pretty much stuck at 63, and with this cooler/fan/case combo, I shouldn't be having any heat issues... It idles at 32C right now, which is pretty cool IMO. Regardless, when it hit 100C, nothing bad was happening... no BSODs, no artifacts, it didn't try to shut itself down... I don't know what would've happened had I let the test continue. As soon as I saw the number I stopped Orthos, rebooted, and looked at the temp in the system monitor panel in my BIOS: it only read 39C, and kept climbing back down. Does it really get that cool that fast? Is it possible speedfan was reporting the wrong temp?

I want to stress test this CPU overnight but temps like that worry me more than just a little... I mean, it's only a $120 CPU, but I wouldn't want to have to buy another one if this one fried.

 

[jhurst]

Originally posted by: KeypoX
thats pretty impressive OC ... you should be pretty happy with 3ghz stable... as far as errors, restarts are very common in my experience. when you get to high windows will not make it. And when its even worse the bios will not post. Also blue screens are not all that uncommon. Random lock ups common as well. And thats about it though i have had a windows or two corrupted before. And need to reinstall.
But thats about it but prolonged voltage increase will decrease the life of your cpu. But most people will not use them that long anyways. Unless you seriously overvolt then you can fry it pretty fast

What is your definition of stable? If you are getting restarts, BSOD's, non-POST's, lock ups, OS CORRUPTION, then you are OBVIOUSLY not the person to be taking advice from. I've OC'ed systems for close to 8 years now, and have never experienced frequent disasters like you speak of. If I start getting errors in Windows, its pretty much time to back down. Each chip can only go so far, there is no point in trying to squeeze out an extra 100mhz out of your system to try to post stats.

If there was one guy on this forum that I wouldn't be taking advice from, its THAT guy.

 

[EvilRage]

So far, it's seemed stable. While I was running it on 3.2, I tried installing Fallout 2 - it kept crashing during the install screen (that was only while I was installing from the menu brought up by autorun - I backed down to 3.0, ran the "setup.exe" from the CD directly, and it installed no problem, except it crashed after FINISHING installation, when it tried to play the two preview movies for Planescape Torment and something else. Weird.)

I think it's odd, because before that I installed Starcraft and Brood Wars, no problem (and they installed quick, too) and they're from around the same time period. Even installed and patched Battlefield 2142.

So I'm not sure if the failure to install a 10-year old game was due to my overclock or the fact that the game is just OLD and tried to basically run something that came out of Windows 95 (it said something about a win95 movie when it crashed, like that's what it was trying to run).

So who knows. Like I said, it SEEMS stable. But Orthos/Speedfan say otherwise, and I'm not about to take the chance of my CPU running at 100C for extended periods of time, even if there's no crashing/artifacting/errors etc etc.

 

[KeypoX]

Originally posted by: jhurst

Originally posted by: KeypoX
thats pretty impressive OC ... you should be pretty happy with 3ghz stable... as far as errors, restarts are very common in my experience. when you get to high windows will not make it. And when its even worse the bios will not post. Also blue screens are not all that uncommon. Random lock ups common as well. And thats about it though i have had a windows or two corrupted before. And need to reinstall.
But thats about it but prolonged voltage increase will decrease the life of your cpu. But most people will not use them that long anyways. Unless you seriously overvolt then you can fry it pretty fast

What is your definition of stable? If you are getting restarts, BSOD's, non-POST's, lock ups, OS CORRUPTION, then you are OBVIOUSLY not the person to be taking advice from. I've OC'ed systems for close to 8 years now, and have never experienced frequent disasters like you speak of. If I start getting errors in Windows, its pretty much time to back down. Each chip can only go so far, there is no point in trying to squeeze out an extra 100mhz out of your system to try to post stats.

If there was one guy on this forum that I wouldn't be taking advice from, its THAT guy.

wow you are about all but useless... these are errors, nowhere did i state that these mean a systems is stable. He asked for common errors and i told him. If there is anyone on this forum i wouldnt listen to it would be the asshole that says he has never had an error.

And i have been overclocking for longer then 8 years.

 

[KeypoX]

Originally posted by: EvilRage
It was stable on Orthos for over 2 hours; I set it up and ran it and then took a nap... was kinda waking up and -thought- I heard what sounded like a POST beep... so I woke up my monitor and looked at the temp in speedfan... 100C :Q

I don't get it, it had seemed pretty much stuck at 63, and with this cooler/fan/case combo, I shouldn't be having any heat issues... It idles at 32C right now, which is pretty cool IMO. Regardless, when it hit 100C, nothing bad was happening... no BSODs, no artifacts, it didn't try to shut itself down... I don't know what would've happened had I let the test continue. As soon as I saw the number I stopped Orthos, rebooted, and looked at the temp in the system monitor panel in my BIOS: it only read 39C, and kept climbing back down. Does it really get that cool that fast? Is it possible speedfan was reporting the wrong temp?

I want to stress test this CPU overnight but temps like that worry me more than just a little... I mean, it's only a $120 CPU, but I wouldn't want to have to buy another one if this one fried.

Yes it does cool that fast and 100C is way to hot i would back down on your OC some. check the seating of your heatsink too. 100C is way to hot wow im cant believe your computer didnt shutdown? Dont you have the setting on your mobo that autoshuts down at a certain temp? like 85 or something?

 

[EvilRage]

Originally posted by: KeypoX
Yes it does cool that fast and 100C is way to hot i would back down on your OC some. check the seating of your heatsink too. 100C is way to hot wow im cant believe your computer didnt shutdown? Dont you have the setting on your mobo that autoshuts down at a certain temp? like 85 or something?

I think something's wrong with Speedfan. I tried again, same overclock more or less. It actually ran 4hours+ on both 3000 and 3115 MHz, so I figured a bump up to 3200 shouldn't be a problem. I upped the FSB, booted into windows and ran Orthos for about 30 minutes or so, went away from my computer for a few minutes and when I came back, Speedfan reported CPU temps at a whopping 116C!

I was more suspicious this time, but I still shut down Orthos. This time the temp didn't go right back down - it stayed at about 100C for a few minutes. Odd. I closed Speedfan and started it back up, and it was still like that.

I think the weirdest part was that it showed System temps at around the same range. Now normally when I've been OCing, the "System" field in Speedfan shows -65C, all the time, every time, no matter what. This time, it showed System @ 121C.

And one more thing. Despite the CPU being measured at 98C, Core 0 and Core 1 were each reporting temps of 28C and 24C, respectively. That can't be right.

Speedfan showing 98C on CPU, next to Core Temp showing lower numbers too
Speedfan and Core Temp at idle

 

[soccerballtux]

Originally posted by: KeypoX

Originally posted by: jhurst

Originally posted by: KeypoX
thats pretty impressive OC ... you should be pretty happy with 3ghz stable... as far as errors, restarts are very common in my experience. when you get to high windows will not make it. And when its even worse the bios will not post. Also blue screens are not all that uncommon. Random lock ups common as well. And thats about it though i have had a windows or two corrupted before. And need to reinstall.
But thats about it but prolonged voltage increase will decrease the life of your cpu. But most people will not use them that long anyways. Unless you seriously overvolt then you can fry it pretty fast

What is your definition of stable? If you are getting restarts, BSOD's, non-POST's, lock ups, OS CORRUPTION, then you are OBVIOUSLY not the person to be taking advice from. I've OC'ed systems for close to 8 years now, and have never experienced frequent disasters like you speak of. If I start getting errors in Windows, its pretty much time to back down. Each chip can only go so far, there is no point in trying to squeeze out an extra 100mhz out of your system to try to post stats.

If there was one guy on this forum that I wouldn't be taking advice from, its THAT guy.

wow you are about all but useless... these are errors, nowhere did i state that these mean a systems is stable. He asked for common errors and i told him. If there is anyone on this forum i wouldnt listen to it would be the asshole that says he has never had an error.

And i have been overclocking for longer then 8 years.

It's hard to OC for 8 years where you've only been alive for 7. Your behavior and typing skills spilled the beans. Sorry.

 

[EvilRage]

Hey guys, seriously, I still need help. Does anyone know what's going on with my temps?

 

[Borealis7]

IDK...but my kettle is busted, can you come over and heat some water for my morning coffee?

 

[Acanthus]

I have the same chip bought recently and hit a wall around 3.17ghz on stock cooling.

i was unwilling to exceed 1.45v as i want this chip long-term.

 

[EvilRage]

So I'd unintentionally left my CPU OC'd to 3.2, despite the alleged heat issues, and I played some CS Source. No problems (But HDR was enabled by default! Awesome!) as far as I could tell.

Once I was done, I looked at Speedfan's temps. They were pretty normal.

I then proceeded to browse the web for several hours.

Here's what speedfan was telling me afterwards.

Yeah. So definitely a glitch and not my CPU overheating. Phew!

 

[MikeyLSU]

Yeah, I think the mobo is default to shut down at a certain temp, which is usually around 80, so if it really did get that high, it would shut down. I'd also get TAT also to read your temps.

 

[math20]

So the cpu was at 98 but the cores were only around 25? That is pretty messed up.

 

[Acanthus]

Originally posted by: math20
So the cpu was at 98 but the cores were only around 25? That is pretty messed up.

Intel Flaming Cache(tm) Technology!

 

[betasub]

Originally posted by: EvilRage
Speedfan and Core Temp at idle

System temp at -65C? That'll be your LN2 cooling at work, right?

You either need to reconfigure SpeedFan, or use some other temp monitoring software.

 

[Stephen8454]

Hey evilrage, i have near identical spec's as you have.

I got my OC stable at 3.01GHz yesterday but have not tried to get it higher just yet. I may but I am pretty happy w/ 3.01GHz.

Have you tried to OC the RAM yet? I have the same RAM, HSF, and mobo but my CPU is a e6320 w/ the 4MB cahce.

Let me know what you have done w/ OCing your RAM. That is my next step but have not tried it yet...

 

[SerpentRoyal]

Let's use common programs so we can compare notes. Download and run latest version of RMClock. Post this temperature when you want to compare CPU core speed. It may not be the true temperature, but that's what I use to bench my overclock. You should see 30-33C idle with 80F room temperature. A quick 10 min test at 75C is okay, but you should limit long term runs to 65C max.

My 4300 is locked at 3.42GHz with 1.475Vcore and a maximum CPU temperature of 65F with Orthos, and 74F with TAT (Intel thermal analysis tool). The top speed is currently limited by the Big Typhoon/120 x 38mm medium speed Panaflo. These C2D chips will put out a lot of heat with a small bump in Vcore.