e8400 overclock

[Raider1284]

I went in on the recent FRYs deal for the e8400 cpu. My old e6400 was overclocked to 3.2ghz, I literally pulled out the e6400, plugged in the e8400, all I did was reduce the voltage by .1 and everything else was left the same. Machine boots up at 3.6ghz into windows.

Totally easy, which was great, but I'm wondering how much further I can push it. Was hoping to get other user's experiences with the e8400; tips and suggestions, that sort of thing. Is 1.25v too much voltage for 3.6ghz?

I'm running this on the p5b-deluxe motherboard. In terms of noticeable difference it def performs better in tests but not a huge real world difference, which is to be expected i guess.

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

start off at the vid which i think is 1.1500v even at 3.6Ghz ... disable cpu and pci-e spread spectrum; enable load line calibration which should keep it from drooping too much. Using HW monitor, I am reading a 1.07v at idle and with prime95 running, it drops to 1.06v stable too.

 

[amenx]

Originally posted by: Raider1284
... but I'm wondering how much further I can push it. Was hoping to get other user's experiences with the e8400; tips and suggestions, that sort of thing. Is 1.25v too much voltage for 3.6ghz?

I doubt you'll be able to push it much more with that RAM.

 

[Raider1284]

is it okay to leave the memory running at spd settings? I know back in the amd days it was really important to keep the ram and fsb in sync; is that still true for C2Ds?

 

[imported_Champ]

Originally posted by: Raider1284
... but I'm wondering how much further I can push it. Was hoping to get other user's experiences with the e8400; tips and suggestions, that sort of thing. Is 1.25v too much voltage for 3.6ghz?

Set voltage to auto (should be fine at 3.6) and see where it stands, even though auto will overshoot it you will be able to see where it approximately stands then you can take it down a couple notches or push for something higher.

agree...your gonna need a little higher speeds, if you wanna be safe go with 1066 (for the potential of +400fsb) and use 2 sticks just to take some stress off the northbridge

What batch number did you get for your E8400 as each will perform differently, it starts with Q8 or Q7? just the Q and first 3 digits.

It is good to start with a 1:1 until you feel your OC is stable, after that it is up to you on whether you want to lower timings or increase speed or even find a happy medium...there will be very little noticable difference between the two unless you run benchmarks like everest.

basically keep trying until you find something that will work, and remember to try different multipliers for stability (alot of people cannot do 9x but 8x or 8.5 works wonders). For myself the highest stable i was able to get was 454x8.5=3.86 (bad batch) but alot of people with a good batch can do 4.0 on vcore under 1.3

 

[Me XMan]

I have E8400 @ 4GHz on 1.44V on Foxconn P35A, NB 1.4V, RAM 2.2V.

 

[imported_Woody]

Although 3.6GHz is probably not too stressful on that chip and since you already knew the rest of your components could handle it based on the previous settings it's not a good practice to overclock a new chip right off the start like that. Take note of your old settings and start from default to make sure the chip is at least stable before you overclock a brand new chip. It's just good practice for everyone else that might read this forum thread.

You can't find the limit of your CPU until you know for sure what the limit of your other components are. Lower the multiplier of your CPU and your memory ratio then push your FSB up gently in small increments until you find the limits of stability. Then lower your FSB and push up the memory divider so your chipset isn't limiting and then push up the memory speed to find the memory limit. Then after you've determined how fast your board and RAM can safely go bring your CPU multiplier back up and gradually push the FSB up to push your CPU past 3.6GHz in small increments without exceeding the known limits of your FSB and memory.

Use memtest and Orthos to test stability and be sure to closely monitor all temperatures as you go.

Your CPU should clock nicely up to a point where voltage requirements start to go up and temps increase. When you've reached this point you are beginning to stress the chip and are close to the limits. For long term reliability you want to run as close to stock voltages as possible. You can push the chip too far for a little while to see what it can do...this is fun...but don't run it 24/7 like that or you will risk failure. Voltage and temps kill the chip, not clock speed.