I need help overclocking a Q6600 on an Asus P5Q deluxe

[imported_goldlight]

Hello.
I recently decided to switch out my Intel E7200 and replace it with a Q6600 quad on My Asus P5Q deluxe motherboard. I had no problem oc'ing the E7200 and I got a great 4 GHZ oc.
However, It has proven difficult to overclock the Q6600. I'm guessing that the 65nm quad has a different procedure. I cant get past 2.5 Ghz? I have updated to the latest bios and etc. I manually set ram voltages and timings and etc. The E7200 reached 4 ghz with minor bios adjustments. Please help. I'm looking at reaching a stable 3.4 Ghz oc.

Here are my stats:

Asus P5Q deluxe MB
Q6600
OCZ titanium 2 gigs pc 6400
OCZ vendetta 2 cooler
Thermaltake 750 watt PSU
Asus 4870 GPU
Creative extreme music sound card
Windows Xp Pro

 

[OILFIELDTRASH]

I would set the ram at default speed, voltage, timings to start off check cpu-z for spd. 2.5 seems really low. I have a q6600 go stepping 3.1ghz on stock voltage. How are you oc'ing your rig? 3.4 might be a little much to ask. Not because of the chip but the heat. 65nm chips run hot as hell.

 

[OILFIELDTRASH]

I would set the ram at default speed, voltage, timings to start off check cpu-z for spd. 2.5 seems really low. I have a q6600 go stepping 3.1ghz on stock voltage. How are you oc'ing your rig? 3.4 might be a little much to ask. Not because of the chip but the heat. 65nm chips run hot as hell.

 

[imported_goldlight]

Yeah I set the ram to default settings. 800mhz 4 4 4 12 timings 2.1 voltage and etc.
Then I started raising the FSB in increments of 10. Restarting after each increment of 10 and booting into windows xp. When I hit 2.5 ghz or 286 FSB it wont boot into windows. Then I tried rasing in increments of 5 and it still would not pass 2.5. I also have a GO stepping and i know that I should at least get pass 2.5. I would settle for 3.2 GHZ. Lol

 

[OILFIELDTRASH]

What is the voltage set at? Maybe the mobo is setting voltage too low? Are you running the same memory that you ran with e7200 oc? My mobo was setting voltage at 1.30 stock. If you know that memory is stable at those speeds and timing and your mobo can run at those fsb speeds I would suggest a slight bump in voltage.

 

[n7]

Originally posted by: goldlight
Yeah I set the ram to default settings. 800mhz 4 4 4 12 timings 2.1 voltage and etc.
Then I started raising the FSB in increments of 10. Restarting after each increment of 10 and booting into windows xp. When I hit 2.5 ghz or 286 FSB it wont boot into windows. Then I tried rasing in increments of 5 and it still would not pass 2.5. I also have a GO stepping and i know that I should at least get pass 2.5. I would settle for 3.2 GHZ. Lol

I hope you didn't actually do the bolded.

You should be setting the RAM to DDR2-533!

You do realize how ratios work, or no?

If you have stock FSB @ 266 w/ RAM @ DDR2-800, that's 2:3 ratio, way too high.

That means the RAM runs 1.5x the speed of the FSB.

So at FSB 286, that puts your RAM @ DDR2-858 4-4-4...small wonder it cannot get any higher.

Set CPU to 9x multi with FSB @ 267.
Set RAM to DDR2-533 5-5-5-15 2.02v (your board overvolts by 0.08v)

Then increase FSB gradually.

You can worry about RAM speed/timings later; you want to keep it lower & out of the way while working on your CPU OC.

Be aware that if you have LLC (Loadline Calibration) off, you will see a decent bit of vdrop/vdroop.
I'd personally suggest enabling it & setting vcore to around 1.35 & work from there depending on how temps are.

 

[imported_goldlight]

Hey N7.
What I meant by default=
I have OCZ titanium memory PC 6400 which equals to 800MHZ.
The default timings are 4 4 4 15 and OCZ recommends a voltage of 2.1 volts.
So this is what I put into my bios. In the bios section of the P5Q deluxe there is a choice for DDR2 800MHZ so that is what I selected.

 

[n7]

That's great if all you want to run is stock.

As i tried to explain in my post above, you cannot do that if you want to overclock.

You are using the 2:3 ratio by doing that, which means the RAM is going to run 1.5x the speed of your FSB, which is why it won't overclock worth crap, since your RAM is limiting it.

Re-read my post & try the settings i explained if you want to be able to overclock half decently...

 

[imported_goldlight]

Hey N7.
Thanks for your help.
I could actually spend more time with experimenting because the weekend is here.
I did exactly what you said and I was able to push to a 386 FSB which gave me a 3.474 overclock easily. I pushed for a 400 FSB but windows would not load. I'm sure that I could easily get 3.6 if I adjusted some settings. Now its time for testing and getting stability for everyday use. I'm curious. Is there anything else that I have to adjust like (nb voltage, sb voltage, and etc) or should I leave everything as is?