How far can I overclock a Phenom 720 BE with the stock heatsink cooler??

[blackrain]

My Phenom II X3 720BE is coming today with a Biostar 790GX. I think I want to overclock. I have seen a lot of people indicate that an aftermarket heatsink fan cooler is needed. Is this just an exaggeration directed to those who plan to overclock to 4Ghz? I am on a budget and was hoping to overclock at least to 3.2 Ghz with the included heatsink fan cooler. What would be a safe target (if at all)?

 

[Keysplayr]

I sit comfortably at 3.2GHz with the stock (kind of crappy) cooler on my 720BE. Stock voltage though. Temps are fine. 64C at full load Orthos. 4th core unlocked.

I would think that upping the voltage if I wanted more speed would require a better HS.

 

[manimal]

3.2 is safe enough as well though I have to doubt the temps I am given by core temp since they appear too low idling at 25 with occt or linpack loads never above 35.
When I pulled the stock air cooler out of the box I thought I was holding a box for a Thunderbird or a barton.

 

[HeavyD]

3.2 was the highest I could go with the stock cooler and stock voltage. 720BE unlocked fourth core.

 

[Munky]

Same here, I could do 3.2 at default voltage, so the stock heatsink should be fine for that.

 

[ShawnD1]

Originally posted by: blackrain
My Phenom II X3 720BE is coming today with a Biostar 790GX. I think I want to overclock. I have seen a lot of people indicate that an aftermarket heatsink fan cooler is needed. Is this just an exaggeration directed to those who plan to overclock to 4Ghz? I am on a budget and was hoping to overclock at least to 3.2 Ghz with the included heatsink fan cooler. What would be a safe target (if at all)?

What does the cooler look like? Saying it's stock doesn't really mean anything. My E6600 is using a stock cooler and it's at a constant 65C. My Phenom 9600 probably uses twice as much electricity but it's only running at 40C on a stock cooler (all 4 cores are running folding at 100%).

Until you know what the stock operating temperatures are, there's really no way to guess how far it can go.

 

[Mothergoose729]

I have a phenom 940BE overclocked to 3.5ghz stable with the stock cooler (1.4v). I would highly suggest lapping them both, as I noticed a full 15c drop in my load temps after doing so. 3.2ghz should be pretty achievable if you use good thermal paste, if you lap it you might be able to push it to 3.6ghz even assuming you don't need to up the voltage (some good motherboards can do that with that CPU).

 

[LoneNinja]

I've got a Phenom II X4 940 @ 3.5Ghz. It runs 63C during Prime95 torture testing and I've got the stock heat sink with Artic Silver on there for paste. I've also got a Phenom 9850 @ 3.0Ghz and sits at 59C under torture testing. I also may have the advantage that my computers are in a basement and room temp rarely exceeds 64F.

 

[daveybrat]

Originally posted by: LoneNinja
I've got a Phenom II X4 940 @ 3.5Ghz. It runs 63C during Prime95 torture testing and I've got the stock heat sink with Artic Silver on there for paste. I've also got a Phenom 9850 @ 3.0Ghz and sits at 59C under torture testing. I also may have the advantage that my computers are in a basement and room temp rarely exceeds 64F.

You also have the advantage that your 2 processors come with a heatpipe copper AMD heatsink.

The 720BE comes with a cheaper aluminum heatsink/fan.

 

[poohbear]

when u guys overclock do u use AMDs ACC utility or the bios? im planning on getting the Foxconn 790fx version since they're so cheap (now $110 here), but i've been reading their bios is really complicated for overclocking because they labelled everything differently and so i need to rely on ACC.

Any probs w/ ACC for a x3-720? thanks.

 

[Munky]

You mean AMD's Overdrive app? It makes it easier to test out various OC settings at first, but once I know what the cpu can do, I use the bios to OC.

 

[poohbear]

yes their overdrive utility, can't i just use that for overclocking? how is it different from overclocking in the bios? w/ bios overclock the overclock is always on, w/ ACC does the overclock only kick in after the OS boots (cause its software based yea?)