[Techspot] BCLK overclocking non-K Intel Skylake CPUs is now possible, tested here

[DrMrLordX]

I've installed the non-K OC beta BIOS onto a ASRock Z170 Extreme4. 4.3GHz and climbing with an i3-6100, results in a day or so.

Are you using the iGPU or a dGPU?

 

[Burpo]

Can't use IGPU when overclocking..

 

[crashtech]

Are you using the iGPU or a dGPU?

I have a Sapphire R9 290. So far the best speed has been 4.4GHz. I think ASRock may need to do some further tweaking on beta BIOS 2.43, since sometimes the machine hangs on POST and needs to be power cycled to get it back on track, but once booted there are no stability issues in Windows. A goodly amount of voltage seems to be a requirement, in excess of 1.385V to achieve 4.4GHz. Both the BIOS and proper voltage reporting are suspect at this point, though. RealTemp 3.70 in particular is fully broken with my setup, reading 100°C at all times. CPU-Z and CPUID HWMonitor seem to be giving good readings. There may be more in this setup if I can suss out some of the more inscrutable settings, but the hang at POST is a deal killer. Not often that I have seen that in an otherwise stable setup. Hoping for another revision soon.

 

[Madpacket]

I have a Sapphire R9 290. So far the best speed has been 4.4GHz. I think ASRock may need to do some further tweaking on beta BIOS 2.43, since sometimes the machine hangs on POST and needs to be power cycled to get it back on track, but once booted there are no stability issues in Windows. A goodly amount of voltage seems to be a requirement, in excess of 1.385V to achieve 4.4GHz. Both the BIOS and proper voltage reporting are suspect at this point, though. RealTemp 3.70 in particular is fully broken with my setup, reading 100°C at all times. CPU-Z and CPUID HWMonitor seem to be giving good readings. There may be more in this setup if I can suss out some of the more inscrutable settings, but the hang at POST is a deal killer. Not often that I have seen that in an otherwise stable setup. Hoping for another revision soon.

Thanks for pointing out the issues. Not really surprising as you're messing with BCLOCK. Everyone glosses over these things when they see CHEAP i3 OVERCLOCKING but it'll probably take a few BIOS etc to get this worked out.

 

[SPBHM]

"no IGPU, No dynamic change of CPU frequency, No C-states, No Turbo Mode, CPU temperature reading is incorrect, AVX instructions have very low performance and Windows XP ACPI not supported."

http://hwbot.org/newsflash/3263_unl...update_asus_asrock_msi_bioses_up_for_download

 

[jpiniero]

"no IGPU, No dynamic change of CPU frequency, No C-states, No Turbo Mode, CPU temperature reading is incorrect, AVX instructions have very low performance and Windows XP ACPI not supported."

http://hwbot.org/newsflash/3263_unl...update_asus_asrock_msi_bioses_up_for_download

That's quite a big list of downsides.

Considering all the effort Intel went into in order to block BCLK overclocking on non-K models, not to mention blocking Xeons from consumer chipsets I still don't get why Intel isn't going to actively block it even if it's pretty crippled.

 

[DrMrLordX]

Wait. AVX/AVX2 is messed up? Why oh why is that the case? The rest of it is not a big deal (to me) but losing AVX/AVX2 sux ballz.

btw crashtech, I think Skylake is "safe" up to 1.4-1.45v so your voltage shouldn't be a huge problem. I don't think.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Wait. AVX/AVX2 is messed up? Why oh why is that the case? The rest of it is not a big deal (to me) but losing AVX/AVX2 sux ballz.

Yeah, kind of makes OCing the i3 versus the Pentium kind of useless.

btw crashtech, I think Skylake is "safe" up to 1.4-1.45v so your voltage shouldn't be a huge problem. I don't think.

Or just stick to Pentium OCing, so if you fry the CPU, no big deal.

(45nm C2D degraded at 1.425v BIOS, so I would be hesitant to push that much volts through 14nm.)

 

[Phynaz]

"no IGPU, No dynamic change of CPU frequency, No C-states, No Turbo Mode, CPU temperature reading is incorrect, AVX instructions have very low performance and Windows XP ACPI not supported."

http://hwbot.org/newsflash/3263_unl...update_asus_asrock_msi_bioses_up_for_download

It's beta :^/

 

[jihe]

"no IGPU, No dynamic change of CPU frequency, No C-states, No Turbo Mode, CPU temperature reading is incorrect, AVX instructions have very low performance and Windows XP ACPI not supported."

http://hwbot.org/newsflash/3263_unl...update_asus_asrock_msi_bioses_up_for_download

Woah, showstopper!

 

[Ferzerp]

Not often that I have seen that in an otherwise stable setup. Hoping for another revision soon.

This was pretty common in the old(er) days when all we could do was change FSB to change cpu speed on boards that wouldn't immediately set the manual voltage and instead did so a bit later on. I had a cpu that I'd wrapped fine wire around some pins to change the requested voltage since that was set immediately and allowed stability. Why I didn't just jumper two holes on the socket I don't know.

 

[DrMrLordX]

(45nm C2D degraded at 1.425v BIOS, so I would be hesitant to push that much volts through 14nm.)

Don't let the volts fool you. Intel's 14nm process seems to come with a fairly sizable reduction in leakage current compared to 22nm. With lower leakage comes potential for higher voltage tolerance.

 

[crashtech]

I think I have settled on 4.35GHz at 1.39V. 4.4GHz at 1.41V was giving me the occasional WHEA error, and I just didn't want to push any more voltage through it. The boot problem has gone away at this setting as well. I may have just been pushing this sample too hard. The i3-63xx series might have more OC potential on average.

 

[VirtualLarry]

I think I have settled on 4.35GHz at 1.39V. 4.4GHz at 1.41V was giving me the occasional WHEA error, and I just didn't want to push any more voltage through it. The boot problem has gone away at this setting as well. I may have just been pushing this sample too hard. The i3-63xx series might have more OC potential on average.

What kind of temps are you seeing, and what cooling solution are you using?

 

[crashtech]

I can't be sure of temps, because my apps are reporting different things. But since I have a Corsair H110, I'm reasonably certain that temps, for me, are a non-issue. If CPUID's Hardware Monitor is to be believed, I never even got to 60C.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Makes me wonder if the screwy / lack of temp readings during BCLK OC, are due to the implementation using the bi-dir PECI bus to control the CPU clockspeed somehow.

 

[Joepublic2]

hmmm

 

[crashtech]

Makes me wonder if the screwy / lack of temp readings during BCLK OC, are due to the implementation using the bi-dir PECI bus to control the CPU clockspeed somehow.

I would like to know if temp reporting can be fixed, or what software is reporting reliably. Then I could test a couple of stock coolers that I have here, both the little aluminum one that came with the CPU, and a copper cored one from a Haswell i7. From experience I know that a dual core can't really faze the H110 no matter what I do, so for now, heat is not a real problem.

 

[Vesku]

"no IGPU, No dynamic change of CPU frequency, No C-states, No Turbo Mode, CPU temperature reading is incorrect, AVX instructions have very low performance and Windows XP ACPI not supported."

http://hwbot.org/newsflash/3263_unl...update_asus_asrock_msi_bioses_up_for_download

"Note that these are in fact BETA versions of the BIOS and there is thus a long list of issues and warnings"

Sounds more like they stripped those out so they could better identify if there are any issues with core BCLK OC functionality.

 

[Phynaz]

The argument was valid on the time posted.

The situation is getting better every day, im still waiting to see if only Z170 will have the feature or they will move down to lower chipsets like H170 or even H110 as well.

Asrock announced overclocking on H and B motherboards.

http://www.pcgamer.com/asrock-to-release-motherboards-designed-to-overclock-locked-skylakes/

 

[DrMrLordX]

Wow, nice. That brings the cost of entry down even further.

 

[SPBHM]

only OC branded specific h170, b150 models
it will get interesting once you have regular h110 boards with unlocked bios

but I'm still curious to see how you can deal with limited voltage/memory settings

 

[AtenRa]

H110 and B150 cannot OC through BCLK due to chipset hardware restrictions. In order to overcome the hardware restrictions those motherboards will be more expensive than ordinary H110 and B150 boards.
I dont know how much more expensive at this point, but it may be better some times to go with the cheapest Z170 boards for a little bit extra cost than choose the overclockable B150 or even the H110.

But im waiting to see how all this will settle down and move from beta stage to retail release.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Ok, I got one of my ASRock Z170 Pro4S / G4400 / 2x4GB Avexir DDR4-2400 1.2v / 7950 3GB GDDR5 rigs built. Currently has a 500W EVGA Bronze PSU, and one video card. I plan on adding another video card, and putting in my Antec Edge 750W Gold PSU.

I OCed to 4.125Ghz @ 1.200v fixed. Under 100% load, CPU-Z read 1.168v.

 

[DrMrLordX]

That's pretty good. What're you using to cool the chip?