Q9300 failed Prime....what is wrong?

[Midion]

this is my first build, so bear with me....

I ran prime95 after getting 64x XP installed, and it ran for 1 min and then gave a fatal error. My temps @ idle were 45C, and @ full load were @ 60-62C. I thought that i might have applied the CPU Fan or thermal compound incorrectly, so i popped it off cleaned off everything and then reapplied. Then ran prime95 again and this time it ran for 11 mins then gave a fatal error, and my temps were 40C @ idle and 60C at full load.

I would like to OC this in the future to about 3.0Ghz, any thoughts on where to start troubleshooting

thanks

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

Send it back to E-tailer if its still under warranty and get a replacement

 

[bharatwaja]

Try to manually set the voltage for the cpu in bios.... then see if it is prime95 stable....

By fatal error, i assume there was a BSOD and the system restarted.... Check ur voltage, set it manually and try again.... at the default voltage with no OC if it fails, then send it back right away.

 

[egale]

Are you sure you don't have bad memory? Try running with one stick at a time.

 

[GarfieldtheCat]

I'd check your RAM as well, is it running at it's rated speed and voltage? IF you are running 8gig of RAM at 1066 speeds, you will probably need to increase the voltage to your RAM (probably to ~2.0V) and your north bridge (don't know nvidia chipset voltages, sorry).

Running 8gig places a big load of the memory controller, especially at speeds over 800Mhz, so that could be why Prime95 fails.

 

[Midion]

I ran Memtest last night and awoke to it failing, so i ran it again one stick at a time, and all sticks were good. Then after checking the manufacturers specs for the voltages (RAM @ 2.05V and NB 1.4V) ran again....failed Memtest #5.... seems you guy are right and that this is a memory issue not the CPU.... Ill head over to that Forum... Thanks for the help

 

[Drsignguy]

He's heading over to that forum ------------------------------------->

 

[Team42]

Originally posted by: Drsignguy
He's heading over to that forum ------------------------------------->

Dammit. The guys over there are useless.

*heads over to memory forum to prove a point...*

Seriously though, unless you've gone through the overclocking guide rigorously, you'll be hard pushed to identify a single failure in your set-up.

Did you try everything at stock values first? Did you manually set stock values? Did you change anything at all?

 

[Midion]

@ Team42 : I manually changed the values to what G.skill recommended for the 780i with a 333 Mhz CPU, which i have... I am assuming that these settings are the stock settings, but i will try the default settings...

 

[Drsignguy]

Originally posted by: Midion
@ Team42 : I manually changed the values to what G.skill recommended for the 780i with a 333 Mhz CPU, which i have... I am assuming that these settings are the stock settings, but i will try the default settings...

You are running 8Gb of ram right? As per your sig, says 4 x 2gb. If so, I would remove 2 sticks ( make sure they're good ) and then try your OC. Here's why: 8 Gb puts a big strain on the NB and getting stable clocks will be a bit more difficult. I had one hell of a time OC'ing with 8Gb with my Q6600. I could get it to 3.2 but anything past that, way to high voltages and said nope leave it at 3.0 for good measures. Now My Q9450 didn't have a problem at 3.4 but since I have 800Mhz ram, that's about the limit of my Oc (for now). Try it and see what happens. At a 7.5 multi with a 333 fsb ( stock), you should be able to hit 3.0 fairly easy and have headroom with your ram. Just make sure you up the FSB in small increments. You will probably hit a wall on the FSb way before your ram craps out. Set your Ram at its defaults, your cpu should start out at its VID level and make sure you set your PCI-E @ 100Mhz.

Mind you, this information I have just listed is from my gigabyte P35 board(s). Not really sure how an 780i will handle this but try it and see.

 

[Midion]

So am currently stable.... passed 8 hrs of Memtest and am currently running Prime on all 4 cores. my CPU is OC to 3.0 with a 7.5 multi, my FSB is 1600 and ram set to 400Mhz which gives me a 1:1. Core temp says my VID is 1.2375v while Cpu-z says 1.184v. Ram is @ 1.8v and NB is @ 1.5v.

I still think that its bologna that i cant get it stable at the manufacturers specs though

Now my ? is temps... While running Prime all cores 100%, I am seeing temps ranging from 62-72 on all cores, idle was 40-45... all temps were pretty close in Core temp and HW Monitor... are these temps 2 high?

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

nope those are normal for a quad and ambients of about 82F