i5 2500k running @ 2.7GHz instead of 3.2Ghz?

[BAD311]

I built two identical gaming rigs, one for me, one for my girl. We both have the ECS P67H2-A2 mobo, she has a Antec liquid cooled heat sink, I'm running a Corsair H100 heat sink. Both machines have a i5 2500k.

Her machine is running @ 3.2Ghz while mine is only running at 2.7Ghz. I confirmed this speed within the BIOS and also in Windows 7.

I'm curious what the issue could be? Why did it work fine in hers, not in mine? Do I have a faulty CPU?

What are my options for fixing this? or should I just call Intel and get a replacement?

Everything else on the system seems to be working perfectly.

 

[Sunburn74]

Check the bios settings. Make sure you have turbo on. Make sure the right multipliers are in place.

Make sure you're not just catching the cpu in power savings and it truly does run at 3.2 ghz. Download something like prime95 and see if the cpu fully jumps to the max speed.

If it doesn't, I'd suspect a bios issue. Make sure you have turbo on. Make sure the right multipliers are in place. Turn off the power features to see if that helps (particularly c1e, c3/c6, and EIST)/ If that fails, I'd flash/reflash the bios to the latest version. If that fails, then I'm thinking about switching cpus with her and seeing if the problem is replicated with the switch. Depending on the result, you may RMA your board or your chip....

 

[BAD311]

Well I went into BIOS and disabled the energy efficiency option under the CPU performance, in the BIOS the clock speed still showed up as 2.70GHz... I rebooted the machine and ran Prime95 benchmark with the Windows CPU/MEM window pulled up and a 3rd party Windows side bar CPU monitor, in Prime95 it started running and within seconds two cores came up with errors and stopped benchmarking those cores, the other two cores continued to test in Prime95 and show 100% in both CPU meter windows.

It also showed hyper-threading unavailable in the BIOS under CPU performance... As far as my wife's machine goes I'm not sure on her settings yet, all I know is her clock was 3.20Ghz and everything was working properly, lol. Her keyboard battery died, so I'm waiting on that to charge up.

Ok... 5 mins later and I just performed a Windows Experience Index test, it got about 2-3 minutes into it, I glanced away and my machine restarted. Now it shows up as 2.10GHz. Just booted into BIOS and it too shows as 2.10Ghz. I'm afraid to change the multipliers, but they are all set to default and/or auto.

Suggestions from here? Should I try PRIME95 again and save the stress log and post it on here? is there anything else I can run to check to get more data on confirming it's a bad mobo and/or cpu? Could my OCZ 120GB Vertex 3 SSD be causing all these issues???

Hmmm......

 

[tulx]

Definitely doesn't sound like a SSD issue (although the Vertex 3 is a bit infamous for having all sorts of weird thinngs going wrong, this should not be one of them).
As one of the previous posters said, swap your and your girl's CPU's and see how they perform. If yours is still underclocked in her machine, you should probably return it for a replacement. If the issue is with your motherboard (the now fullly functional CPU underperforms when put in your mobo), you should, as also said, update the BIOS of that board and, if nothing changes, return it for a replacement.

 

[BAD311]

BTW, my rig specs are as follows:

ECS P67H2-A2 MOBO
Intel i5 2500k CPU
16GB Corsair Vengeance PC3-12800 RAM (1600MHz) (currently # 1333MHz in BIOS, so not OC)
120GB OCZ Vertex 3 SSD
EVGA Geforce 460 SE x2 in SLI config GPU
Windows 7 Ultimate SP1 OS
Cougar SX850 PSU
Corsair H100 Heat Sink

 

[amenx]

Have you tried resetting the bios? Is it also latest bios for the board?

 

[BAD311]

Hmm, I'll update it here shortly. I did notice the boxes had a good bit of dust build up on them, I'm hoping one was older and has a older BIOS.

Will report back in a few hours!

 

[sm625]

Sounds like you got a bad interconnect between cpu and socket. I wish intel hadnt cheaped out with their LGA garbage.

 

[masterbm]

I would first try like the one person did and reset the board to factory defaults. The next thing is to download the current version of cpu-z . And may post a screenshot for us to look at. When you post screenshot of cpu z have it running prime 95 with all cores. And if it is i5 (2500)sandy bridge hyperthreading will be disabled should only be enable with i3 sandy bridges and i7 sandy bridge. The other thing before you reset your board factory defaults disable any software that may increase energy effecincet or overclocking.

 

[BladeVenom]

Switch with your wife, then yours will be 3.2Ghz. Problem solved.

 

[inf64]

2500K is 3.3Ghz (base) clock chip,not 3.2Ghz. Its max Turbo is 3.7Ghz. It does not have Hyperthreading enabled so it will show "just" 4 cores under task manager(and not 8 threads).

 

[Arkaign]

Nice systems. ECS though, sigh.

clear bios to defaults, update bios to latest from ECS, clear bios to defaults again, check status then.

99% of weird problems like you describe turn out to be mobo, memory, or OS issues, in that order usually.

 

[BAD311]

Hey guys, I hit the BIOS reset on the mobo earlier today, loaded it up into BIOS and changed the Energy Efficiency setting from enabled to disabled... Rebooted, and it's showing up as 3.3Ghz now in the BIOS, CPU-Z and in the My Computer properties.

I changed this setting last night as well and nothing changed. So resetting the BIOS and only changing that setting seemed to work, so far!

I'll report back if any issues come up. My CPU temp is a constant 30-32*C @ idle. I'd love to do a push/pull on my H100 unit but do not have enough room for the pull fans within the case. My girls machine is using a Antec H20 in a push/pull config @ 31*C, lol. Makes me kinda jealous considering what I paid for them.

As far as the ECS mobo, it comes with a 72 hour replacement guarantee AND I paid $90 after rebates/discounts/promo codes instead of $200.

Only got the Geforce 460 SE cards because after promo codes, rebates, etc... I paid $30 per unit from Newegg, lol.

 

[Sunburn74]

I'll report back if any issues come up. My CPU temp is a constant 30-32*C @ idle. I'd love to do a push/pull on my H100 unit but do not have enough room for the pull fans within the case. My girls machine is using a Antec H20 in a push/pull config @ 31*C, lol. Makes me kinda jealous considering what I paid for them.

Those temps really aren't anything to brag about. I'm running a 2600k at 4.4ghz with all power saving settings on. I also have it set to use about .05v less than stock voltage. My cooler is a thermalright ultra 120 (pretty old cooler. been around for like 5 or 6 years) with a single 120mm fan inside a silverstone ft02.

Anyway my idle is like 22-24 degrees and my full load after 6 or 7 hours of prime95 is like 55-58 degrees (never over 60).

You can really drop your temps by adjusting voltage so once you have your pc stable, try to slowly bring down the voltage. I'm not sure about ecs boards, but gigabyte boards let you adjust voltage using dvid so that voltage is variable and not static. Basically at idle my cpu uses like 0.8 v and at full load jumps to 1.26v and everything else in between. However, if i punch in 1.26v it stays at 1.26v all the time. I have to use the dvid to get variable vcore and to maximize power savings.