Some overclocking safety questions

[srygonic]

I tried overclocking once before and screwed up badly...
http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.aspx?catid=28&threadid=1673822
I had to RMA my HDD to get my system working again..

Now my itchy fingers want to try overclocking again. Ok I already did. But I want to be safe..

If I don't mod my voltages will I usually be safe? If I don't change the voltages how high can I go usually?
I tried overclocking abit just now..
FYI:
- AMD 64 3000+
- MSI K8N Neo4-F

- I restarted my computer and went to decrease my HT (learnt my lesson) to x4 decreased my multiplier to x6 and pushed my FSB to about 220
- I hit save and exit and when it booted up properly again I went straight in BIOs without going into windows and changed my FSB to about 225.
- I did the same thing again and upped my FSB to 230 and changed my multiplier to x9 and booted into windows.

And now I'm here.. so I would like to know,
1)If 'able to boot up' means all the way till windows or just the bios? If it's unable to boot up what usually happens? The motherboard makes beeping sounds and you have to restart your bios on the mobo to boot in?
2)How far usually can I get on stock HSF and no voltage modding? (if it's garaunteed to be safe and won't fry my computer)

 

[HostofFun]

Make sure if it's a serial ATA drive on an Nforce4 chipset to plug it into ports 3 or 4, NOT 1 or 2. 1 and 2 are usually unlocked on those chipsets (FSB/HTT wise) and will basically overclock your hard drive's chipset, which it can't handle. 3 and 4 will keep it at its stock speeds.

If you're able to boot up, it does not mean you will neccessarily get into Windows. The BIOS is a lot less sensitive to overclocking than Windows is, and you may encounter Blue Screens Of Death (BSOD's) even if you can boot up. In this case, since you do not want to raise voltages, you will need to back off in some respect of the overclock and try again.

If you DO get into Windows, that still doesn't mean that it is a stable overclock. This is where people differ on what a stable overclock is. Some view it as a run of benchmarks or "burn-in" programs such as prime95, sisoft sandra, superpi, and 3dmark looping for awhile without errors or freezing. Some view it as whether or not their games and applications run without erroring out or crashing. This is somewhat of a personal preference, but if you do anything involving important calculations or a distributed computing project, you want to know that your PC is not putting out wrong data to the projects.

If you cannot POST (the DOS-like screen at the beginning where it shows your motherboard info, CPU clockspeed, etc.), you will need to clear the CMOS with either a button or jumper on your motherboard. Look for information on your specific motherboard in the manual. Usually the method is a jumper that you use after you unplug your computer and turn off the PSU switch on the rear. To do this, you move it from its default position (usually pins 1-2, there are 3 pins), to the other position (pins 2-3) for several seconds to short the power to the CMOS. This clears all of the settings and will generally let you boot again.

As far as how far you can get, it really depends on the type of CPU (is it a Venice, Winchester, etc. chip? if it's a Venice it should overclock REALLY well), and luck to an extent on how well your CPU can do. Keep in mind that you can and will shorten the lifespan of your components by overclocking. How much depends in large part on how far you have pushed your components, and how much they can handle. I would recommend backing off a bit from your maximum stable overclock to help ensure a longer lifespan.

I hope this post helps... if you have more questions, post back for help !

Originally posted by: srygonic
I tried overclocking once before and screwed up badly...
http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.aspx?catid=28&threadid=1673822
I had to RMA my HDD to get my system working again..

Now my itchy fingers want to try overclocking again. Ok I already did. But I want to be safe..

If I don't mod my voltages will I usually be safe? If I don't change the voltages how high can I go usually?
I tried overclocking abit just now..
FYI:
- AMD 64 3000+
- MSI K8N Neo4-F

- I restarted my computer and went to decrease my HT (learnt my lesson) to x4 decreased my multiplier to x6 and pushed my FSB to about 220
- I hit save and exit and when it booted up properly again I went straight in BIOs without going into windows and changed my FSB to about 225.
- I did the same thing again and upped my FSB to 230 and changed my multiplier to x9 and booted into windows.

And now I'm here.. so I would like to know,
1)If 'able to boot up' means all the way till windows or just the bios? If it's unable to boot up what usually happens? The motherboard makes beeping sounds and you have to restart your bios on the mobo to boot in?
2)How far usually can I get on stock HSF and no voltage modding? (if it's garaunteed to be safe and won't fry my computer)

 

[srygonic]

Wow thanks a ton you're really helpful. I learnt a few well-used acroynms from that post alone.

Sorry I forgot to mention mine is a Venice core. So how much should I be able to overclock with this guy with stock HSF and no voltage modding usually? I do not want to raise voltages if it helps me be more stable in overclocking and not fry any component unnecessarily... If I do not want to raise voltages then what aspects should I be backing off in?

So you're saying that I should boot into windows and reset my computer from there before rasing my FSB again? Oh btw my HDD is a IDE drive, so does that matter for anything?

My motherboard lets me just press a reset button... thanks MSI. That rocks so much!

Also, one more question.. can I just overclock my CPU and not bother about my RAM? Cause I've been reading alot on RAM dividers and all that stuff but I do not understand much... I can't find any RAM divider options in my BIOs at all.

 

[HostofFun]

Wow thanks a ton you're really helpful. I learnt a few well-used acroynms from that post alone.

Thanks . I appreciate it.


Sorry I forgot to mention mine is a Venice core. So how much should I be able to overclock with this guy with stock HSF and no voltage modding usually? I do not want to raise voltages if it helps me be more stable in overclocking and not fry any component unnecessarily... If I do not want to raise voltages then what aspects should I be backing off in?

Every chip is different as you know, but I would expect you could get to about 2.3-2.4ghz on stock (or near-stock) voltage with a little luck. Raising the voltage on the CPU helps keep an overclock stable, and if it's only a little bit (0.05 or 0.75v) on an A64 Venice core, it won't shorten the lifespan of the CPU by much at all. On the "backing off" from your maximum stable overclock, I mean backing off in the overclock speed on the CPU by 50-100mhz from its maximum stable on the voltage you use. This will help greatly in ensuring that your CPU does not fry prematurely , and that there aren't any errors that don't show up in testing that the CPU might be putting out, indicating it is not actually working properly but not known by you.


So you're saying that I should boot into windows and reset my computer from there before rasing my FSB again? Oh btw my HDD is a IDE drive, so does that matter for anything?

Yes, I would make sure you can at least boot into Windows before trying to raise the FSB again. Some would say you should run a quick test of some sort such as a SuperPi 2m or 4m run, or a Sandra cpu and memory bench to make sure it doesn't lock up before you raise it again (which is what I personally do every few steps I raise the FSB, i.e. once every couple of reboots). As far as the HDD being IDE, then no, it shouldn't matter for anything. Just make sure that your PCI lock is on properly (in the BIOS) so that it doesn't scale when you adjust your FSB/HTT/etc.

My motherboard lets me just press a reset button... thanks MSI. That rocks so much!

Nice . My new Small-Form-Factor (SFF) Shuttle SN25P-based rig that I'm building today (last parts just came in as I was in the middle of writing this post) has a button, too. It is a much nicer method in my opinion.


Also, one more question.. can I just overclock my CPU and not bother about my RAM? Cause I've been reading alot on RAM dividers and all that stuff but I do not understand much... I can't find any RAM divider options in my BIOs at all.

Yes, you can. However, you do need to use the RAM divider so that it does not get overclocked, while your FSB/HTT do and raise the CPU speed. You should see something like "FSB RAM RATIO" or "RAM DIVIDER" with options such as 1:2, 200mhz 1:1, etc. in your BIOS. It is typically under the main overclocking page, but sometimes it can be hidden away in menus that make no sense to anyone but the BIOS coder . I did a google search and found this thread: http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview...atid=28&threadid=1636425&enterthread=y where people discuss using the RAM divider with your motherboard, so I believe it does have it somewhere. If you do not find this option, you may have to A) see if there is an updated official BIOS with these options, B) overclock your RAM as well as the CPU, or C) see if there is a modded BIOS on the web somewhere that you can flash to update your motherboard so that you have RAM dividers.

As far as using RAM dividers, basically you can set the RAM to run at a percent of your FSB/HTT speed. For instance, an 8:10 divider would make it run at 80% of your FSB/HTT speed, so if your CPU can hit 2450mhz, and the multiplier is, for example, 10, you could run at 245mhz FSB/HTT, with an LDT multiplier of 4x (you want your HTT to be somewhere between 800mhz and 1000mhz, it can be a bit lower than 800mhz without affecting performance, but over 1000mhz can affect stability greatly), and a RAM divider of 8:10. This would result in a 2450mhz CPU speed, a 980mhz HTT speed (within the tolerable range), and a RAM speed of 196mhz (it is OK to underclock your RAM a little bit if needed).


Again, if you have any more questions along the way, post back . I will check this thread and try to help out.

 

[srygonic]

Thanks alot again... You've been really really helpful. Thanks for the link and everything else..
I have to sleep now but I'll take a good read at that link tommorrow.

But what you're saying now since I didn't find/change any PCI lock or anything in the BIOs is that my RAM is also overclocked as well? So my RAM & CPU is running at 230MHz? Wait... *does a quick check with CPU-Z* oh yes you're right.
But is it safe to overclock my RAM so high? How much can a RAM usually overclock to? I'm using 2x512MB kingston RAMs..

BTW, what's this FSBRAM - CPU/9 thing in my CPU-Z under the memory tab? Is that the divideR?

 

[HostofFun]

If you didn't change your RAM divider (yes, that is the FSB : DRAM CPU/9 item in CPU-Z that reports your divider) then yes, you are overclocking your RAM right now. Really, there are no hard limits, just averages and general safe voltages that most people adhere to depending on their cooling type and hardware specifics. Depending on the type of RAM, latencies used, capacity, chip density, chip type, PCB type (the actual board that the chips are mounted on), etc., RAM can run the gamut from overclocking to virtually nothing to 280-300+mhz with extreme cooling and high voltages.

What I would do, if you want to find out the average that your RAM overclocks to, is a google search for your specific RAM model and then look inside whatever you find for the version number (if applicable) on your RAM to see what you find. However, that isn't really neccessary, as some RAM can go a heck of a lot higher than the average overclock others might get out of it. Some will also be duds, and do much less than the average.

Just see how high yours can go, and test it with a boot disk with the program memtest86 (link: http://www.memtest86.com/ ). Loop test #5 a couple of times and see if errors come up... if it's a small number (1-10) after awhile, or none, you're likely good to go. If it's a high number (hundreds, or even thousands of errors... if they start racking up quickly, exit the program and lower your overclock, as it's not good for the hardware to run at those speeds), you're going to want to change something such as voltage, speeds, RAM timings (i.e. the 2.5-3-2-11 kinds of numbers you probably have seen thrown around often), etc. and try again. I always use memtest86 as a first check when I am overclocking my RAM after I can successfully boot into Windows.

Let me know how things go ! Good luck!

 

[srygonic]

Ah, so my divider is at 9 right now? Can you explain my timings to me and how to optimize them? It's at 2.5-3-3-8 right now... I know what it does and everything but I don't know if higher or lower is better and all that stuff.

I don't have a floppy drive. Is a CD-Drive ok? I have memtest on my computer in windows though, is it ok if I load it from there?

Again, thanks a ton. You're the most helpful person that ever helped me in a thread.

 

[GuitarDaddy]

Don't shy away from vcore if its needed to maintain stability. vcore wasn't the cause for your hard drive corruption, instability was. You can corrupt your hard drive just as easily overclocking on default voltage. And IMO most HDD corruptions come from RAM or PS instability.

Here's some ways to prevent HDD corruption

1. Download Clockgen NF4, and use it to verify that the PCI and PCI-e busses remain locked.
2. Increase your overclock slowly, small steps at a time. And test throughly for stability at each step, especially RAM using Memtest.
3. Back up all your data before you begin, and overclock and test your ram first before overclocking your CPU, then always stay within your rams tested limits and timings, when overclocking the CPU
4. When you think you have the overclock you want test stability extensively using Prime95/OCCT/S&M and Memtest for several overnight runs. If it fails at any point, back down a few mhz and start over. Watch your temps during stability testing, but don't worry about "over stressing" your system.

 

[srygonic]

Ok so I'll increase vcore but I won't go above 1.5v which is the safe region for a venice core right?

Is it ok to use Memtest in windows instead of booting up? If I overclock and test my RAM all the way till it limits do I stand a chance to spoil any hardware in my computer? 5MHz per time is small enough right? Thanks alot for the tips!

 

[srygonic]

So is it ok to use memtest it windows? Is it any different from using it when booting up?

Also, what else do I need to do to ensure whatever is locked so that I don't overclock anything else..