Time to overclock... Voltage?

The_Other_One

The_Other_One

VIP Member
I've been so behind the times, refusing to overclock my machines... I decided I should give it a shot :P Though, I found something fairly strange out about my system.

I checked the stock/auto settings, and my CPU core voltage was 1.1v. Isn't that a little low for my Athlon X2 4200? I checked around and they apparently run at 1.30-1.35. I manually set it to this in the bios, and everything seems fine(not that it wasn't stable to begin with...) However, I'm fairly new to this so I wanted to double check.

If all is well, I might try a bit more...

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Oh yeah... I'm running cool 'n quiet. When going at the lowest speed, the voltage is only 1.095(by PC Wizard) Does this sound alright? It bumps up to 1.33 when going full speed.
 
a mod asking for OCing help?? whats this?? lol

i OCed my X2 3800+ easily to 2.5 and thats when my mobo topped out, at 270 bus and a 10 multiplier, so i left it at 2.5. that was my board though, because others have locked at that FSB too.

just play with the HT multiplier to keep your HT multiplier times the bus speed close to 1000, play with your speeds, dont touch the CPU multiplier, and up the voltages every so often. at a certain point lower the HT multiplier accordingly as you raise your BUS speed and keep the RAM divider at the lowest settings for now to take RAM out of the equation
 
Haha, well what confused me more than anything were my low voltages... But yeah, I've heard of people getting 2.7 fairly easily out of the 4200. I'll probably go a bit farther in just a second.
 
I assume you have core temp to measure core temps? As long as core temps are 55C or below at full load, the voltage you have is fine. Your PC Wizard can report core temps as well (I prefer that utility over core temp, actually).

Then again, jumping from 1.5V to 1.525V may only give you an extra 30MHz, so may not be worth it.
 
Im running 2.8 @ 1.450v and is stable, have cranked in to 3.0 @ 1.5v but was unstable and crashed. Was thinking of doing a volt mod on my mobo but then gave up lol so Ive left it at 2.8.
 
Hmm... Well I could try some more... I got it to 2.64GHz at 1.33v. I tried around 2.7 something but it wouldn't POST, but I didn't bump the voltages up. I'm still a little iffy on what I want to try ^^;

As for temps, I never REALLY did much, but they never got above 39*C
 
2.64GHz on stock voltage? Very nice indeed.
As long as temps are fine, 1.45V is absolutely fine for 24/7 use. With a good heatsink, full load temps usually hit 50C at the most.

Get a hold of Orthos (and run the Small FFT's test). It calculates prime numbers (well, I'm pretty sure it does at least), and if your CPU is unstable, it will eventually 'mis'-calculate a prime number. Orthos will generate an error, and you can see that your CPU isn't quite stable. Difference between Orthos and Prime is that Orthos can stress test both cores without you having to set affinities.

It also gets the CPU to generate a lot of heat under full load. Whatever full load temp you get with Orthos, that will be your highest full load temp. F@H, for example, will not quite hit those core temps, even when running 2 instances.

Obviously, make sure it's not your memory stopping you from posting.
 
thealmightyone said:
2.64GHz on stock voltage? Very nice indeed.
As long as temps are fine, 1.45V is absolutely fine for 24/7 use. With a good heatsink, full load temps usually hit 50C at the most.
Click to expand...
*nods* My board tends to run at a rather low voltage, as in around 1.1v on it's "Auto" setting. I manually bumped it up to around the "normal" 1.32v for the overclock. I've gone back to stock speeds, but I left the voltage bumped up...

I'm running the stock cooler right now. Temps never really rose any, but I didn't put that much stress on it.

[QUOTE}Obviously, make sure it's not your memory stopping you from posting.[/QUOTE]
I do have cheap-ish RAM in here... Should I decide to try and take it farther, it'll probably be what holds me back the most. I know it won't be my mobo. Man, this Asus lets me get around 300+ MHz FSB :P
 
Are you able to put your memory on a divider? That will bring the memory speed down a bit. Ideally, choose the divider that gets the memory running as near to stock speed as you can. As you increase FSB clock, you'll need to adjust the divider.
 
You can't change your memory speeds? ie, set it at DDR333 instead of DDR400?!? Even my junky Intel board can do that...

It is most likely what is holding you back.
 
Are you able to manually set the memory speed down to DDR333? On my older boards thats what I had to do in order to keep the RAM stable.


And perhaps the voltage was down because Cool'n'Quiet was in use?
 
sorry to post off topic.. well not off topic but off your question. Its not worth a new thread.. How high is safe to run core voltage?.. my mobo goes up to 1.9V+.. I have never gone over 1.5.. I am at 1.46 right now with a light overclock.. runns nice.. I can get quite a bit more out of it but I dont really see a gain from it.. anyway..basicly. Can i smoke the processor with to high voltages?..

I am using a 3500+ single core right now (o/c'd to 3800)
I am gettin a 4200+ X2 on sunday.. if that matters.. ? lol.. thanks
 
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