Features - QOTW: do you still overclock your PC?

[danroyle]

i overclock but usually to somethung sensible i always see how far it goes then clock it back BIT


cannot vote either

[Lee H]

I have a few profile settings saved on the P8Z68-V PRO so sometimes I boot up and run at 4.5 GHz, some days I run at 5 GHz and some days I run it at 4.7 GHz.

Why?.... because I can that's why

I use the CPU @ 5 GHz to get through my LHC@home tasks quicker

[aidanjt]

As for the erroneous computations, prime 95 for 24hrs is more than enough in my book

Not in mine. That only proves that you might have a 50% probability of running prime95 calculations for 24 hours error free. Pretty shoddy odds for a specific application on a machine which will run for tens of thousands of hours feeding completely different and random series of instructions. Such clocked-on-the-edge quantum scale bit flip events are often subtle, possibly cumulative, and completely random in both time and target. The more energy you pump through the silicon means the more easily background radiation flips the bit states of the CPU's registers and execution units.

So, if what you're working on matters at all, not overclocking greatly mitigates the risk of data corruption.

[crossy]

Memory's had a gentle overclock - mainly because I bought modules that claims to be stable at a speed more than the stock one for the motherboard.

Graphics card and processor have excellent utilities provided that allow some minor degree of upclock when needed. For example, if I'm doing some music/video conversion then I'll use the desktop shortcut that allows the stock 16x multiplier to boost to 19x.

Maybe I'm easily pleased these days, but I seldom find myself thinking "sheesh, I wish I had a faster processor", a lot of stuff seems to be disk bound instead and there's not a lot I can do about that at the moment (roll on the days of affordable 500GB+ SSDs!)

[Kushan]

I wasn't reading this on an overclocked PC, I was reading this on an overclocked PHONE! HTC Desire OC'd to 1.13Ghz from 1Ghz stock. Sometimes, this kind of thing is just in your blood.

[kalniel]

undervolt ftw

(ok so bumping clock speed after the undervolt might be happening a bit to boost games that don't thread well)

Poll clearly needs more voltage though.

but out of the 30+ models available, less than half-a-dozen are designed with overclocking in mind. And those that are tend to be the most expensive - which somewhat defeats the purpose.

Is there much of a price difference between a i5 2500 and a i5 2500k?

[atmadden]

I always overclock the cpu and generally always buy with the most headroom as its part of the fun.

[Noxvayl]

I'm not a fan of artificial overclocking limitations. Having to spend £165 on the cheapest overclockable CPU of the latest generation is a massive step backwards from 4 years ago when you could overclock all CPU's available.

Perhaps that's why AMD still sells enough CPU's to stay in business.

[Hicks12]

Still overclock here, i dont know why i just found 4ghz to be smoother than 3.3ghz on my 2500k and with it being able to do it below stock voltages i thought why not , i managed 5.1ghz but didnt want to keep it at that for any reasonable period (was only to see what i could hit!), i plan to overclock it to pieces when im nearing my 3 - 4 year upgrade schedule to ensure it lasts that far .

Plus the fact i have a decent watercooling setup to be aimed at silencing my pc, may aswell use the shed loads of cooling power available .

[EvanJackPenn]

I think I'll overclock more towards the end of a processor's life, or if I'm playing a more CPU scaling game. I saw a benchmark for Skyrim somewhere.... Aha!



For games like this, I'd probably do a mild overclock. As long as my temperatures aren't wild, and my fans are happy, then we're all good!

[Hoonigan]

Currently got my 2500K overclocked at 4.5GHz. It never goes above 55'C, even after hours playing BF3 in a very warm room; and that's with 0.1v added.

Got my GPU overclocked slightly aswell, only around 5%, but I get a solid 60FPS on BF3 @ 2048x1152 so I don't need it any higher yet.

Overclocking is all part of the fun of buying and building your own PC, instead of buying a box from Dell..


If anyone wants to bring some Nitrogen round, we can see what this 2500k will do

[drharvey12]

Spent a fair amount getting all my GPU's and CPU water cooled in a custom built loop. Seems a bit of a waste of money to not overclock them at least a tad!!!

[mark22]

I run my 2500k at 4.6GHz on auto voltage (keeps idle temps lower) and this took a couple of minutes on first boot. OC the 6950 as well when needed and of course it has it's cores unlocked. Some processors are meant to be overclocked, why not do it?

[OilSheikh]

I tend to go with stock speeds. Its fast enough at stock for me

[Thorburn]

Used to enjoy my overclocking a lot, even to the point of briefly holding the 3D Mark 2001 top spot in the ORB (in front of a certain other former HEXUS writer if I remember correctly, which I do, because I took a screenshot).

Ran a Vapochill and then a Prometeia, along with ridiculously noisy air-coolers, but I grew out of it now. I work all day with hardware in various states of development and stability, when I come home I want my PC to be faultless.

Occasionally at work if we're asked for an overclocked system for a specific demo or event I'll put one together, and have helped out on Liquid Nitrogen and Liquid Helium overclocking sessions, but I generally find it more frustrating than fun.

[[GSV]Trig]

I havent overclocked since my socket7 days iirc.
I find I'm more likely to underclock these days, especially GPU to keep the fans on the QT..