Yet Another Q9550 OC Thread

[NaOH]

Upgraded from my E8400 which was at 4ghz stable ( I usually ran it at 3.8 ish due to heat and to make sure it was rock solid). I replaced it with a Q9550 and started OCing it right away last night. So far, I'm at 3.65ghz with 1.31v in CPUZ with load temps of 50C. I'm hoping to be able to at least get close or hit 3.8 but it seems like it needs a lot of voltage past 3.6. What are some voltages you guys used to achieve this?

 

[alyarb]

what motherboard and RAM are you working with? what CPU stepping? 9550's require more fine-tuned voltage configs. you aren't going to get to 3.8-4.0 with just vcore.

 

[NaOH]

P35-DS3R, E0 Stepping A, Corsair Dominator 1066 2x2gb

 

[NaOH]

I have .2+ to FSB and .1+ to MCH. It's been freezing after being at full load for a few hours, so I've just been bumping up the vcore slowly.

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: NaOH
Upgraded from my E8400 which was at 4ghz stable ( I usually ran it at 3.8 ish due to heat and to make sure it was rock solid). I replaced it with a Q9550 and started OCing it right away last night. So far, I'm at 3.65ghz with 1.31v in CPUZ with load temps of 50C. I'm hoping to be able to at least get close or hit 3.8 but it seems like it needs a lot of voltage past 3.6. What are some voltages you guys used to achieve this?

1.4v to reach 4.0 GHz; i got 4.33 GHz on my e8600 at the same overvoltage.

What kind of cooler/case are you using? What are your ambient temperatures?

 

[Zapper48]

Iv'e run my 9550 EO at 4.0 with 1.275v LLC on Prime 95 for 24 hrs. Took some tweaking to get it there with P45 chipset.

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

Freezing might be the NB voltage or somewhere else

 

[NaOH]

I upped my MCH a bit more and raised my voltage to 1.41-2 on full load (CPUZ) so it's stable at 3.74ghz. Any less voltage and it will not boot into windows properly. gah, looks like mine isn't going to be able to hit 4.0 easily.

 

[KingstonU]

Going from 3.6 to 3.7 on my C1 stepping 9550 with P45 P5Q-Pro took a lot more volts so I leave it at 3.6GHz.

 

[Elias824]

Im running mine at 1.35 at 3.7ghz, had some other issues so im rechecking my voltage now. im running on a p35ds3r, (436 x 8.5) ram is +.3v but close to stock speeds. everything else it at stock voltages. Id like to hit 3.8 as well but im not sure if it will be worth the extra voltage/heat. One another note ive been using the intel stress testing program to stability test it, and holy cow it gets way hotter using that then with P95, been up to 68c. Anyone had any experience with that program?

 

[KingstonU]

Yah Intel Burn test (linpack i think it's called) does in 15 minutes what Prime95 does in 1 hour. So lots of people use it to save time in stability testing. However others, like me, see it that I will NEVER load my computer the way linpack does, including playing the lattest games while doing severe multitasking in the background. So if I am trying to get it to be stable under linpack, then I am robbing myself of overclocking head room. Heck, even if one of my cores fails prime 95 in 1 hour I still find my system rock solid enough for my needs. But I do try to get it P95 stable at least for 6 hours.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Originally posted by: KingstonU
Yah Intel Burn test (linpack i think it's called) does in 15 minutes what Prime95 does in 1 hour. So lots of people use it to save time in stability testing. However others, like me, see it that I will NEVER load my computer the way linpack does, including playing the lattest games while doing severe multitasking in the background. So if I am trying to get it to be stable under linpack, then I am robbing myself of overclocking head room. Heck, even if one of my cores fails prime 95 in 1 hour I still find my system rock solid enough for my needs. But I do try to get it P95 stable at least for 6 hours.

Dude, making sure your system is stable, is not "robbing you of OC headroom".

 

[Elias824]

Is their some other weakness that maybe linepack dosent test for? Ive been lazy about Ocing my last few cpu's mostly because im on my computer way to often and I usually dont like to spare 8 hrs for prime testing. Have a faster stability check is pretty handy. Id prefer to have a more intensive test too, seems like ive had quite a few times where my computer would be prime stable, but I would still have crashes.

 

[OILFIELDTRASH]

run p95 overnight

 

[Elias824]

the probelm is my computer is in my room, and I think I added one to many LED fans. I could also run it while im at work and thats what i usually do, but Im usually not at work that long and when I wake up in the morning I usually have enough of an issue trying to put on socks, let alone remembering to setup the prime test on my computer.

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

would defiantly be better off with a UD3R or P

 

[NaOH]

Okay, I have a question. You know how each CPU has an operating range of volts? If you want to keep from killing it, do you go by the voltage you see in CPUZ or the one in the Bios? Like for example, when people say they got their CPU stable at 1.36v at 4ghz, are they talking about their voltage in windows? Is that the one you worry about? Cause that was my impression and my method so far.

 

[NaOH]

nm...sticky answered my question. I feel like my Q9550 is gimped in relation to a lot of other people. I have the voltage set to 1.41ish in the bios just to get stable at 3.65ghz. Whereas other people are at 1.25v....wtf? I was at 3.4 while under the stock voltage and any attempt to go past that using anything less than 1.38ish volts and it will freeze during the windows boot screen (loading bars). I played around with the FSB and NB voltage to no avail. Fail

 

[elconejito]

it's possible you got a gimpy CPU, they aren't all made the same. I'm not familiar with that board, what other voltage settings do you have available (pressing Crtl+F1 at the main BIOS screen may give you more options) and what do you have them set to so far.

 

[NaOH]

Originally posted by: elconejito
it's possible you got a gimpy CPU, they aren't all made the same. I'm not familiar with that board, what other voltage settings do you have available (pressing Crtl+F1 at the main BIOS screen may give you more options) and what do you have them set to so far.

I've messed around with the NB volt and FSB voltages but the NB voltages doesn't seem to do much. I have the FSB voltages to +2 (out of 3), nothing for the NB (I tried adjusting this, but still doesn't boot into windows). I haven't tried pressing ctrl+F1 but I don't see anything that would lead me to believe there are extra options.

 

[Elias824]

Oh dude you have the same board as me, dont increase your FSB or MCH voltage, its based off your dram volts for some reason. Try that if your having bus issues. im stuck at 1.35 and 3.7ghz, +.3v on my ram and nothing else. Bus is running at 436mhz.

 

[Dadofamunky]

What I'm curious about is how swapping out a 4+ GHz OCed dual chip (like mine) for a 3.6-3.7 GHz Q9550 could lose you any performance. To my mind, particularly in the workloads I do, the small drop in clock speed would be more than made up in lower latency when running a lot of tasks. My system's plenty fast and runs like a tank, but I still get mouse freezes every so often (usually I/O driven) that take the system 5-10 seconds to recover from. Nary a crash, just odd hesitations once in awhile when I have DVD/BluRay playing and I run things like a long download along with Skype and 30-40 browser tabs. So I'm taking a hard look at getting a 9550. I don't think the clock speed matters all that much past a certain point.

 

[NaOH]

Originally posted by: Elias824
Oh dude you have the same board as me, dont increase your FSB or MCH voltage, its based off your dram volts for some reason. Try that if your having bus issues. im stuck at 1.35 and 3.7ghz, +.3v on my ram and nothing else. Bus is running at 436mhz.

Yeah, is that true? If it is, that explains a lot. Adjusting the MCH didn't do shit except make it unstable. I'm using auto mode right now for the voltages and it has me at 3.7 stable at 1.38 in CPUZ. I'll go back and leave everything at normal and see how that goes.

Weird thing is, I underclocked the CPU and upped the FSB to 450 to see if it would boot. No go =(. It might just be my motherboard. I never had to go that high since my E8400 had the higher multiplier.

 

[NaOH]

Okay, for me, the FSB voltage stabilizes the OC once I try to get 3.6-7. Or else it freezes during the loading of windows. I guess I'm shit out of luck and this motherboard is holding me back.

 

[NaOH]

Originally posted by: Dadofamunky
What I'm curious about is how swapping out a 4+ GHz OCed dual chip (like mine) for a 3.6-3.7 GHz Q9550 could lose you any performance. To my mind, particularly in the workloads I do, the small drop in clock speed would be more than made up in lower latency when running a lot of tasks. My system's plenty fast and runs like a tank, but I still get mouse freezes every so often (usually I/O driven) that take the system 5-10 seconds to recover from. Nary a crash, just odd hesitations once in awhile when I have DVD/BluRay playing and I run things like a long download along with Skype and 30-40 browser tabs. So I'm taking a hard look at getting a 9550. I don't think the clock speed matters all that much past a certain point.

You're right. Just irritating seeing a lower number. It's kind of fun trying to figure it out too ( a bit stressful at the same time)