Overclock

[Jingles762]

Hello,
I am having a go at overlclocking, mainly so that I can play GTA4 at something other than a slideshow framerate. First:

Asus PK5C mobo
E5200 processor Multiplier 12.5x, fsb 200
4gb Corsair RAM DDR26400 800MHz
HD4850 gfx

1. I am following the advice on Clunk's guide, and I have a couple of questions:
Firstly, the way I read the guide it seems like I must set RAM timings and voltages exactly like in the screenshot - surely they will be different for different ram modules? Is it not best to leave these settings on [AUTO] in the BIOS (which is what I did on my first attempt)?

2. My BIOS gives me warnings about dropping the memory ratio below 667Mhz (w/fsb 200), saying something about spec conflict iirc, is it safe to ignore these warnings?

3. I take it I don't want to exceed 800Mhz on the RAM when adjusting the fsb up. Am I correct in thinking it is best to get as close as possible to this value when selecting fsb and timing ratio to maximize memory speed?

4. I had a go at a modest overclock - timing ratio set at 667Mhz, bumped up to 800Mhz by changing fsb to 240, giving 3ghz clock. Booted into Vista fine and temps are cool, but it was failing Orthos and Prime95. Would the next step be to drop the ratio to 1:1, so the memory is <800Mhz? Would this improve stability? (but brings up question 3. again :S)

Thanks for your help!

EDIT: Just found the answers to some of these questions at the bottom of the guide, didn't see them beyond the advanced section. Sorry for the spam.

[Nelsaidi]

I hope you know everything varies from CPU to CPU, and motherboard to motherboard.

Hope all goes well for you.

[Agent]

I hope you know everything varies from CPU to CPU, and motherboard to motherboard.

Yes, but not by a huge amount

[Blaineoliver]

You need more voltage.

[DataMatrix]

Just so you know, GTA IV is buggy as hell and you aren't getting the performance you should be due to bad programming.

[Jingles762]

Ok, having dabbled in it, I have decided overclocking is not for me... seems like too many risks. Having run an unsuccessful overclock and gone back to defaults, is it neccessary for me to reformat and reinstall Vista? I am reading things about file corruption due to unstable overclocks causing problems with Windows.

[vinnyT]

No need to reinstall your os, just set the bios to default, and boot as normal.

[nukeman8]

can i just ask what mainly put you off overclocking?

im considering it myself and i know there are risks attached to it, the only 1 that really puts me off is shorter life span for whatever your overclocking as i build a pc then use it for a fair few years.

[sleepyhead]

can i just ask what mainly put you off overclocking?

im considering it myself and i know there are risks attached to it, the only 1 that really puts me off is shorter life span for whatever your overclocking as i build a pc then use it for a fair few years.

Shorter lifespan...hmm depends on how far you go perhaps.

I managed to get my xp2500 (1.83Ghz) to just over 2.1Ghz without having to up the vCore. That was running like that for 5 years at least on air. That was my first overclock without any guides; after reading Clunks post I'm sure I could have gone past 2.1Ghz.

Don't give up on overclocking, it's satisfying when it works and as far as I have experienced, nothing bad happens when the overclock goes wrong (as long as you take it slowly with small incremental steps).

[Jingles762]

Hi, thanks for the reassurances! Glad to know I havent hurt my comp

The reason I decided to try overclocking was to get the best out of my games - I built my rig with a xigmatek cooler and good airflow case so I could overclock in the future if I wanted to, with assurances from my tech friend that overclocking was relatively straightforward. Having looked around the net, I see mainly forum topics along the lines of 'halp I tried overclocking now my computer wont start what do I do?!?!?!111.' I greatly fear that I would end up posting such a topic... although I can follow instructions on ocing guides, I dont really have the understanding behind it (you can tell by my questions ), and I d probably end up in trouble.

The second reason is that as far as I understand, an apparantly 'stable' system according to Prime95 may not in fact be and will start throwing up errors behind the scenes that arnt immediatley obvious, and just generally be a pain.

As it is, my system is more than capable of running newer games at good spec, so i dont see the need to tempt fate.

For those who are interested, the overclock I did (see top) gave me another 8fps on GTA4, from <25 to ~33. So GTA4 is very CPU dependent.

Thanks everyone for your help anyway, Ive learned a little bit more about computers if nothing else

[Zadock]

Use intel burn test its the quickest way to test your stability.

[Jingles762]

Ok, Im posting in this thread in case the problem relates to something I have done above.... I am back at stock settings on everything now. I left my computer running just now, and when I came back to it it was in monitor-off power saving mode (main system still running)....wiggled the mouse, nothing happened. Then noticed the HDD light was permantly on. Mashed a few keys, nothing... so press and hold power button to restart, enters Windows ok - now my mouse doesnt work... it's an optical wireless mouse, was working fine before, the paired keyboard still works. Plugging usb cable mouse works, but my wireless one is dead.... is the Vista crash related to / caused by previous ocing attempts? Or could it be related to the mouse apparantly dying? I changed batteries in the mouse, so it isnt that... suggestions?

EDIT: And also System restore doesnt work, it can't locate my C drive for some reason... lots of problems this week, best thing to reinstall?

[nukeman8]

Use intel burn test its the quickest way to test your stability.

doesnt intel burn test generate a lot of heat compared to other testing means? As in dangerously high levels of heat.

[Zadock]

Define dangerous

I'm OC'd to 3.0GHz on a Q6600, I used the burn test... it got up to 65 degrees, that was a tad higher than I got with other tests yeah.

But as is said above, its quite difficult to do any permanent damage when over clocking there are fail safes to prevent it.

[sleepyhead]

Ok, Im posting in this thread in case the problem relates to something I have done above.... I am back at stock settings on everything now. I left my computer running just now, and when I came back to it it was in monitor-off power saving mode (main system still running)....wiggled the mouse, nothing happened. Then noticed the HDD light was permantly on. Mashed a few keys, nothing... so press and hold power button to restart, enters Windows ok - now my mouse doesnt work... it's an optical wireless mouse, was working fine before, the paired keyboard still works. Plugging usb cable mouse works, but my wireless one is dead.... is the Vista crash related to / caused by previous ocing attempts? Or could it be related to the mouse apparantly dying? I changed batteries in the mouse, so it isnt that... suggestions?

EDIT: And also System restore doesnt work, it can't locate my C drive for some reason... lots of problems this week, best thing to reinstall?

I'm not too sure whats going on, reinstallation should only be a last resort unless it is a relatively fresh install so just go ahead and do it. If it was me, I'd back stuff up and try to cure each fault as I see them, for example I'd remove the drivers for the wireless keyboard and mouse and reinstall. I'd check the power settings to make sure the HDD and monitor power on and off correctly. Depending on the type of AV software, your PC may have been in the middle of scanning and using alot of system resources to do so (highly unlikey but hey, I used to have Norton System Works on an old PC and that killed the PC if it decided it wanted a full system scan) hence HDD light on and slow/no response from input. Alternatively the PC have have accidently been trying to go into sleep/hibernate mode.

[Jingles762]

Thanks, I tried the mouse on a different (XP) computer, and it didnt work at first, then came back to life, and is now working again in Vista :S No idea what is going on there.

For the power settings, do you mean the 'standby after 30 mins' kind of settings, or something in the BIOS?

Ill post the system restore query in a different thread.

Cheers